The Harvester Arc 4: Shadow Knight
by Jakathi
Summary: In which Soralis gets kidnapped by Quan Chi and whisked halfway across the galaxy to the Republic for nefarious reasons. Primary Xover with SW: PrePhantom Menace and SG:SG1. Finished!
1. Chapt 1: Morgan Enterprises

Standard Disclaimers apply. My characters belong to me; their characters belong to them. This is for fun. Obi Wan and Qui Gon share a close and loving father/son type relationship, completely **non-slash**people.

**Morgan Enterprises**

**Death is the great equalizer...**

**                               From the Harvester's Journals**

The Bothan security guard covered his nose with a cloth as he examined the decomposing body. He growled under his breath as he saw how battered the body was. He just hoped it had been done after the poor fool had died and not before. He carefully withdrew a small amount of blood from the body and tested it with a small device he held in his hand. 

The Bothan cursed roundly and several of his compatriots looked at him curiously. "Alert the Council. We found their missing Jedi Knight. One of them at least." He amended.

***

Qui Gon Jinn was up to his neck his blaster fire as the five remotes circled him, each one a separate, potentially deadly hazard he had to deal with. Thankfully, the remotes would only stun him if a stray beam accidentally hit him. He expertly deflected the beams and tumbled behind a pillar. The remotes zoomed in on him; their intentions were very clear.

"Master?" Obi Wan's voice broke through his concentration. He raised his hand, invoking the force and stopped them telekinetically. 

"What is it?" he asked as he calmly snuffed his lightsaber and clipped it on his belt.

"Yoda wants to see us both in the Council chamber," he replied.

Qui Gon's expression tightened. Something told him he wasn't going to like this. "Let's not keep them waiting," he said. Together they left the practice room.

***

Qui Gon Jinn's misgivings grew as he and his apprentice were escorted into the chamber. Instead of a full council, he only saw Masters Yoda and Mace Windu waiting for them. 

"Qui Gon, we have found Master Zanar Dun." Mace Windu told him grimly.

Qui Gon hand clenched unconsciously. He and Zanar Dun had gone through temple training together and they had been close friends for many years. Master Dun had gone missing a few months ago while he and his apprentice had been overseeing a trade summit on Alderaan. Several teams had been sent in search of the missing Jedi and one of those teams had never returned. "Alive?" he asked hopefully.

Mace Windu took his friend's arm and guided him to a chair. "No I'm afraid not. He was found on Etti IV. The Bothan security guard who found him estimated that he had been dead for several weeks before they had found him."

"No. It can't be," Qui Gon's mind went numb with disbelief. Zanar had been one of the most intelligent men he had ever known, as well as being a powerful Jedi Master in his own right. 

"How did he die?" Qui Gon demanded, his eyes flicking from Windu to Yoda. 

"Badly," Mace replied. "We think he was tortured to death," 

Qui Gon swallowed. "What did you get him involved in?" he demanded.

"Narl Organna has long suspected Morgan Enterprises of illegal activities, but all of his own attempts to get solid evidence on the company has failed. Many of his operatives have died under suspicious circumstances and others have simply quit. He finally contacted the Brotherhood. The evidence he presented was not enough to indict Morgan Leigh, but it was enough for us to assign a Jedi Knight to investigate the company. When Jedi Knight Sitari and her apprentice went missing, we immediately suspected Morgan Enterprises." Mace Windu told them grimly.

Yoda limped over to the three men, leaning heavily on his cane. "Suspected she is of the Tyn'ari plague outbreak on Delos Three among other things." Yoda replied.

"But you couldn't find any evidence linking their disappearances to the investigations and you couldn't get the courts to give you a search warrant to raid Morgan Enterprises," Obi Wan said shrewdly.

Yoda nodded. "Correct you are. That is when we assigned Master Zanar Dun."

"And now he's dead," Qui Gon said softly, deceptively mild. "And anything he may have uncovered is gone with him." 

"Convenient, isn't it?" Obi Wan remarked in disgust. "Where do we fall in?"

"We want you to get the evidence we need to bury Morgan Enterprises," Mace Windu told them. "It's there. We just need to find it."

"Very well," Qui Gon said and got up.

When the two Jedi had left, Mace Windu looked at Yoda. "Are you sure about this Master?" he asked softly.

Yoda nodded. "No choice, have we. He is the best we have at this now that Master Dun is dead."

***

"Master, I should go with you!" Obi Wan told Qui Gon as they waited for the shuttle transport to Etti IV. 

Qui Gon shook his head. "No, Obi Wan. It's too dangerous." He gripped the boy's shoulder gently. "You saw the holos the Bothans sent us of Master Dun's body. Whoever did that to him is capable of anything. I am not going to risk you. Stay here. See if you can locate any of the people who have investigated Morgan Enterprises in the past. Talk to them and find out what they know. Maybe we can at least get enough evidence to warrant a raid on their data banks."

"Why do you have to go?" he asked softly.

"Morgan Leigh is currently on Etti IV. And I need to see where they found Zanar Dun." He replied grimly. 

"Alright," he said, knowing quite well he wouldn't be able to dissuade his Master. "I'll stay. But be careful," 

"Always," Qui Gon replied and boarded the shuttle.

"Always. Right," the boy muttered as he watched the starship soar out of sight, his heart and mind filling with worry. His master was rarely careful, at least when his own well-being was concerned.

***

**Four Days Later, Republic Corporate Sector Etti IV:**

Qui Gon knelt down closely watched by the Bothan security guard as he examined the site where Zanar Dun's body had been found. "I take it no one goes by this area much," Qui Gon said dryly.

The security guard grunted agreement. "A citizen complained of the smell. We found the body stowed in a drum like that." He nodded to a stack of them piled against the wall of the alley.

"Did you find out who owned the drum he was put in?" Qui Gon asked.

The guard laughed. "This is the Corporate sector Jedi. Nobody's gonna tell us anything that doesn't come with strings attached."

Qui Gon nodded in agreement. "I hear you," he said and turned away from the site. He had learned all he could from it. "Where is Morgan Leigh's office located?"

"You sure you want to speak with her?" the security guard asked curiously as he escorted him away from the alley.

"Yes," 

The guard shrugged. It was none of his business. "I'll show you," he said.

***

Obi Wan scowled as he scanned through data Narl Organna and others had given him. On the surface, everything seemed legitimate. He frowned as he looked through the invoices. Something about them seemed strange.

"Cost overruns?" he murmured to himself. "Computer, see where these supplies are going to." He commanded as he sent the information to his master via his comm-link.

***

Qui Gon sighed as he was escorted out of Morgan Leigh's office complex. Morgan Leigh had been polite, but uncooperative. As expected. His comm-linked buzzed, alerting him to an incoming call. 

"Master, I found something strange in the files I got from Narl Organna." Obi Wan's voice flickered faintly through the comm-link

"How strange?" Qui Gon asked dryly.

"Cost overruns where there shouldn't be any. The supplies seem to be going to this place," the boy said as the information was uploaded into a small, hand-held view-screen.

"I'll look into it," Qui said tiredly.

"You sound like you're having as much fun as I am," Obi Wan told him.

"Probably less. Thank you Obi Wan, I'll look into it." He said.

"You're welcome," the boy signed off and the comm-link went dead.


	2. Chapt 2: Shadow Knight

Shadow Knight  
  
The Harvester stands for the innocent and the dead.  
  
From the Harvester's Journal  
  
"Sub Zero! Watch out!" Soralis shouted as she pushed the black-clad shadow warrior out of the collapsing tunnel.  
  
It was a trap. She berated herself as she lost consciousness.  
  
***  
  
Darkness….  
  
Pain…  
  
Her eyes were open but she saw nothing. She could actually feel each crushed organ re-knit itself, each strand of muscle wrap itself around adamintium-incased bone. She could feel her veins start to pump blood through abused flesh. She gasped for air, the first breath in days. Her body was incased in a gel-like substance that seeped into every pore.  
  
Soralis went still as she searched her mind. Where was she, what had happened? She remembered. They were about to enter the tunnels that led to the cult's hiding place, hoping they could stop Shinnok before he broke free of the time-space "bubble" that caged him.  
  
She and Sub-Zero had elected to be the rear-guard, making sure nothing could get the rest of the group from behind. But something had happened. She had felt the tunnel's roof shift just before it came crashing down and she remembered shoving Sub-Zero free before it had collapsed on her. She heard dry, cool laughter float around her.  
  
She shuddered. Only her healing factor had saved her from being killed. "Who are you?" she demanded. "Where am I?" Her voice sounded strange, almost like it was stuffed with cotton. She touched her face experimentally. A breathing mask? What was going on?  
  
"For now, your host. As for your other question…" the voice paused. "You are no longer on your home planet."  
  
Soralis went cold. "What are you going to do to me?" she asked softly.  
  
The voice laughed again. "I think you will find that out soon enough."  
  
"Let me go!" Soralis snarled, lashing out. This time, three adamantine claws slid out with a wet, metallic hiss to hit whatever it was in front of her. She could feel it crack.  
  
"Pity. I hoped you might be more cooperative," the voice said.  
  
Soralis felt a sharp sting on the side of her neck. She felt weak. Darkness swamped her.  
  
***  
  
Qui Gon moaned. He opened his eyes, but he only saw darkness. He couldn't move and he could only hear his own breathing. He hurt. Everything hurt. Qui Gon felt a wave of panic wash over him. He couldn't remember where he was, what he had been doing.  
  
He breathed deeply, trying to regain a semblance of calm. The panic faded. He didn't need his memory to survive. With that calm, came images, flashes of insight.  
  
He remembered walking into a docking bay and being hit by some sort of light and intense pain. Had he been searching for something? Qui Gon wondered. He shivered. Was it getting colder? What was happening to him? Is this what Zanar Dun went through?  
  
Zanar Dun? He thought. The mission! He strained against whatever was holding him. His muscles shrieked in protest and he fell back. It was useless. He couldn't get any leverage. Cool dry laughter floated around him as the temperature plummeted. A soft white light illuminated him, surrounding the examination table he was apparently strapped to. He winced, letting his eyes adjust to the light.  
  
"Well, well, well. So Organna managed to convince the Council to send another Jedi to investigate me. It's a pity you fools don't know how to leave well enough alone."  
  
"Morgan Leigh," he whispered.  
  
"So you remember. The stun ray often has unfortunate side effects. Memory loss is the most common of those effects." Morgan laughed again. "We still haven't worked out the bugs on that little device yet."  
  
"So it is true," he blurted out. "You did kill Zanar Dun!"  
  
It was freezing now. He could feel the shackles that bound him to the table burn with cold. "He meddled with things that did not concern him as did Jedi Knight Sitari. As you do now." Morgan replied. "They paid that penalty with their lives. A fitting end, I suppose."  
  
The temperature flickered back to just above freezing. He breathed deeply, enjoying the relative warmth. "I really can't let you live. You know far too much about me already. But I would be a fool to let an opportunity to study a Jedi slip by"  
  
Dread seeped into his soul. He had seen the results of Morgan Leigh's experiments. "The council will not stand for this. They already suspect you of Zanar Dun and Sitari's murders. Killing me will confirm those suspicions." He warned her.  
  
The temperature in the room rose to normal. He turned his head and saw a woman, Morgan Leigh standing beside him. Hovering over one shoulder was a sphere-shaped droid bristling with needles, probes, optic sensors and audio receptors of every description. "What's that?" he whispered.  
  
"It's a new interrogation droid my company has been developing. I haven't been able to find a subject to test it on though." She said, a sick smile twisting her lovely face.  
  
Qui Gon instinctively lashed out with the force, intending to smash the thing into a wall. He screamed as his muscles spasmed painfully. Morgan's smile widened. "Poor fool, did you not think I would have taken precautions with a subject like you?"  
  
He looked at her again, breathing harshly. "What have you done?"  
  
"An associate of mine made it impossible for you to use the force to defend yourself or escape from my facility. If you try, your own body will betray you as it has done just now. Any further attempts will result in more pain." She replied.  
  
"Now my friend. I think we should discuss your future with me," she said as the torture droid floated forward. A hypodermic needle swung out of its surface, visibly filling with fluid. Qui Gon swallowed dryly as the needle pierced his flesh.  
  
***  
  
Soralis sat cross-legged on her cot and scowled at the door. She had woken up in a small, windowless room and was none too happy about it. The first thing she had tried to do was escape through the Shadow Realm. Pain brought her to her knees. She next tried to blast the door to hell and again, pain.  
  
Then she carefully examined her own mind. She found a hideous spell encasing her in an invisible grip. This spell was designed to keep her from escaping and using her abilities to attack or defend herself. Furthermore, any attempts to break the spell brought even more pain. She decided to leave it alone for the moment. She found that all of her passive abilities remained untouched.  
  
When she tried to command her symbiont, it didn't respond. Somehow, someway, her captors had managed to disrupt the symbiont's ability to communicate with her neural network.  
  
The room itself was remarkably clean and possessed basic amenities in a small cubical at the far end of the room. Less than ten steps away was another cot, evidently for another prisoner. She pushed her fear aside, knowing quite well they planned on keeping her for awhile.  
  
She sighed, deliberately falling into a trance-like state. Soralis carefully extended her senses, taking in her environment. The cell itself was part of a much larger complex, housing twenty or so individuals. Only a few were human. The rest. She shuddered. The rest were demons. She could expect no mercy from such individuals.  
  
She extended her senses outside the complex. What she found shocked her. The surrounding environment was barely suitable for the even the most basic of lifeforms. The atmosphere was weak, subject to the extremes of heat and cold. Even if she escaped, survival was problematical at best.  
  
Something brushed the edge of her mind. Another presence. Unlike the other individuals in the complex, this presence did not feel evil. And the power of that presence physically shook her as it made a frantic mental grab. The mind that touched her was incoherent with confusion and pain.  
  
Soralis hesitated reaching out to the individual. She did not want to be caught in its agony. Male? She wondered. Yes. It was definitely male and purely human from the mental 'feel'. Abruptly human's pain stopped as she felt it loose consciousness. She hastily dropped out of the trance and opened her eyes.  
  
She could hear the force field flicker away and could feel three individuals behind the door. One of them was the powerful individual she had felt earlier. He was barely conscious.  
  
The cell door opened, revealing the three. Two burly humans supported a third between them. They flung the injured man towards her and she moved to intercept him before he fell.  
  
She staggered as she caught him. "Here's some company. Keep him alive or you'll be dealing with a rotting corpse." One of them laughed.  
  
When they had untangled themselves, the two humans had disappeared; the cell door had slid shut and the force field had snapped back on. She half- carried, half dragged the man to the other cot and helped him lay down.  
  
He was pale, his skin was clammy and his eyes dilated with shock. Soralis easily identified the classic symptoms of severe trauma. She frowned. Why had they tortured this man? She wondered as she gently brushed his hair away from his face.  
  
"Don't," the man whispered brokenly, his voice hoarse from screaming. "Please don't."  
  
"Shhh. It's alright. It's alright." Soralis murmured soothingly.  
  
"It's over for now," she said as she summoned energy from deep within herself, hoping the spell that kept her captive would let her heal the man.  
  
She breathed in relief when nothing happened and the energy readily flowed from her into the injured stranger. His heart-rate normalized, his breathing slowed and the cloudiness in his eyes faded. She slowly brought her hand away, letting the connection fade. She couldn't spare him any more energy.  
  
Qui Gon moaned, blinking his eyes rapidly. He still was weak; confused from the torture. He had been injected with drugs that brought on terrible hallucinations and turned the world upside down, despite every meditation technique he knew. Other drugs, drugs designed to lower pain thresholds had been administered and then he had been subjected to electro-jabbers, fire knives and things he couldn't name. He began shivering uncontrollably.  
  
Soralis sighed as she tugged the blanket over him. He turned, seeing her for the first time. "Who?" he asked groggily.  
  
"My name is Soralis de Mordant. I believe I was abducted by our charming hosts from my own world and brought here." She smiled dryly. "Who are you?"  
  
He was handsome, in his late forties, early fifties maybe. He was tall, taller than her and well built. His eyes were dark, calm. She thought that he was a fighter, maybe something of a priest. His aura was bright and strong, evidently a human bound to the forces of good.  
  
Qui Gon managed a shaky smile. "My name is Qui Gon Jinn. You are not a Jedi Knight," he said, looking at her more closely as the confusion and shock became more manageable.  
  
She looked like she was in her mid-twenties, though he instinctively knew she had to be much older than that. She had the slender, graceful build of a martial artist or dancer and was easily six feet tall. Her face was expressive with finely chiseled features and pale gold eyes. Her silvery- white hair was short, about shoulder length. She was dressed in a simple tunic and pair of trousers, a more feminine version of his own. Like him, her feet were bare.  
  
Soralis smiled briefly. She had no idea what a Jedi was, but she felt she would like them if he was an example. "No, no I'm not. I take it you are." She added.  
  
He laughed, the laughter turning a bit hysterical. It felt good to laugh, to find a release from the terrible trauma he had suffered. "Yes I am." He said, calming down.  
  
"What are you?" he asked, touching her face curiously.  
  
She smiled as she took his hand in her own. "I'll explain later. Get some rest." She told him softly.  
  
"Please don't leave," he whispered.  
  
"Doesn't look like I'll be going anywhere for the moment." She quipped.  
  
He smiled in response to her joke and closed his eyes. She gripped his hand, helping him fall into a healing sleep. 


	3. Chapt 3: Questions and Answers

QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS  
  
Hell no longer frightens me.  
  
From the Harvesters Journal.  
  
Obi-Wan Kenobi paced restlessly in the spacious reception area of one of Coruscant's most powerful law firms, Wolfram and Hart. In addition to being powerful, Wolfram and Hart had the reputation of being utterly ruthless and unscrupulous in its business dealings. Few beings dared cross the firm. Those who did, more often than not, disappeared.  
  
He had already checked out Narl Organna and his family. They had habitually refused to do business with either Wolfram and Hart or Morgan Enterprises and were often at odds with both companies.  
  
Ever since Narl Organna had initiated the investigation on both Wolfram and Hart and Morgan Enterprises, he ran up against a durasteel wall. When the Brotherhood came into the picture, they too ran up against that same wall. Evidence was gathered, but somehow lost, witnesses turned up dead or went missing. The list went on. Anyone who had business dealings with Wolfram and Hart or Morgan Enterprises were too frightened to speak.  
  
Now that Obi Wan and his master had taken over the investigation, they had begun to suspect both the firm and Morgan Enterprises were a front for something much larger and more sinister. Obi Wan had a further reason to keep on with the investigation, despite the all-too-frequent dead ends. He had not been able to reach his master for several days. Obi Wan frowned as the door opened, revealing a man.  
  
The man was in his late thirties, tall, dark-haired and green-eyed. He was handsome in a slimy sort of way and dressed expensively. Obi-One felt slightly sick as he approached the man. He had the same sort of feeling that he got whenever he approached an open sewer on an under-developed world.  
  
The man smiled ingratiatingly at the boy. Obi-Wan was instinctively on guard and gazed at the man uncompromisingly. "I need information on one of your clients, a Morgan Enterprises." Obi-Wan told him bluntly.  
  
"We are not at liberty to discuss our clients' dossier with unauthorized individuals." The man told him just as baldly.  
  
Obi- Wan stared at the man who was growing increasingly uncomfortable. He was unused to being thrown so off-balance by a mere child. "I am a representative of the Brotherhood. We suspect Morgan Enterprises of murder, among other things. Cooperation would be appreciated."  
  
The man scowled. The Brotherhood was a bad enemy to have and would not give up until they had what they wanted. And the boy was not about to be intimidated by him, nor could he bring out one of the senior partners. One look at them and the boy would know for certain that Wolfram and Hart dealt with those who embraced the dark-side.  
  
He sighed. Morgan could go to hell as far as the law firm was concerned. They were not about to take on the Brotherhood before they were ready to do so. "Follow me. I'll give you what we have on the company."  
  
The boy smiled slightly as the man led him into one of the offices and gave him the information on a data-crystal. "I hope this will be helpful." The man said softly as he handed Obi-One the crystal.  
  
The boy gratefully took the crystal. "Thank you for your cooperation." Obi- One said respectfully and did his best to avoid touching the man. The lawyer frowned. Did he sense something? With Jedi you could never tell.  
  
The lawyer escorted Obi- Wan out of the building and watched as he got on a public transport. He spoke quietly into a comm-link. "The boy has the information. What are your orders?"  
  
"Wait," the voice on the other end commanded. As the man entered the firm, there was a tremendous explosion. When it was over, there was nothing left of either the building or the man.  
  
Obi- Wan saw the fireball and swallowed as the transport rocked with the resulting shock-wave. If he had stayed one moment longer, he too would have been caught in the bomb's blast. This was getting serious.  
  
***  
  
Qui Gon woke slowly, enjoying the relative comfort of lying on something soft and being able to move freely. His head ached fiercely and his muscles felt weak and unresponsive. His throat was sore and raw from screaming.  
  
He breathed deeply, going into the most basic of the Jedi meditation techniques. The headache faded and he realized that most of that was probably due to stiff muscles. He stretched, one muscle at a time. A ligament popped. He opened his eyes and looked around, letting his eyes focus to the cell's light.  
  
The room wasn't that large, maybe one and a half square meters, plus a small bathroom. The only furniture was his and his cellmate's cots. His cellmate? He turned and saw her clearly for the first time. She was sitting on her cot, looking at him silently and she was holding a cup of water in one hand. He unconsciously licked his dry, cracked lips, realizing how thirsty he was.  
  
She walked over to him and helped him sit up, then handed him the cup. Qui Gon was dismayed at how much effort it took to hold the cup. By the time he was done drinking, his hand was shaking. The woman took the cup away from him and set it on the floor.  
  
"Feel better?" she asked.  
  
Qui Gon nodded. He liked the sound of her voice, though he couldn't quite place her accent. He remembered how she had partially healed him and helped him fall into a healing sleep when he could barely think coherently. He curiously probed her aura and was surprised at how dark it appeared. Qui Gon did a double take. That darkness seemed artificial and swirled around her in a way no natural aura should.  
  
He probed further, finding that the perceived darkness was in fact layers upon layers of shadows cleverly switch-backing upon themselves; completely hid her true aura beneath them. Still more surprising was how still the Force was around her. Even among ordinary non-Force sensitive people, there was some sort of disturbance. Around her, he couldn't detect anything  
  
Qui Gon could feel her amusement behind the thickly layered shields around her mind and the shadows around her aura parted for a split second. He reeled back in shock at the maelstrom of energy those shadows concealed. As quickly as it appeared, the roiling energy and light disappeared behind a confusing pattern of shadows. He blinked and looked at her. She nodded, letting him know silently that what he saw was quite real.  
  
"It's more show than substance I'm afraid." She said offhandedly. "I can only use some aspects of that power under special circumstances."  
  
"So I take it that this isn't one of those circumstances," he said dryly. His voice still sounded hoarse, but at least he could control it.  
  
Soralis nodded. She was deliberately being as gentle and as non-threatening as possible. The young Shadowlord knew quite well what he was going through. Torture was never pleasant and the after-affects of that hell was often as bad as the torture itself. She guessed this was the first time he had ever been in a situation like this and could safely assume that he was unused to being completely out of control.  
  
She laughed softly. "No, this isn't one of those circumstances. Pity, isn't it?" she grinned at him. "So, mind telling me how you got caught?"  
  
Qui Gon's hands clenched unconsciously. "I was investigating the murder of a friend who had been found tortured to death on a world called Etti IV. This investigation led me to a company called Morgan Enterprises who was suspected of a number of illegal acts ranging from deliberately infecting a population with plague-viruses to manufacturing banned technologies such as torture droids." He laughed bitterly. Narl Organna didn't know how right he was. Qui Gon only hoped he could live long enough to get the evidence to the Council.  
  
"During the course of my investigation I found invoices for supplies that did not seem to be going to any of Morgan Leigh's legal laboratories and companies. I traced the supplies to an unregistered loading dock. When I entered, I was hit with a ray of energy that knocked me out." He was sweating now as he remembered the droid that had fired the energy-beam. It was an almost exact duplicate of the one that had tortured him.  
  
Soralis cursed softly. She was loosing him. "Qui Gon, relax." She said as she took his hand, squeezing it.  
  
The brief contact brought him back to reality. "Why am I feeling like this?" he asked her softly.  
  
"You're still probably suffering from the after-affects of whatever drugs they fed you." Soralis hazarded. "It takes time for that stuff to work out of your system. That and you're still in shock."  
  
He nodded slowly. It sounded reasonable. Qui Gon looked at her curiously. He knew she was helping him deal with what happened. The question was how did she know how to do it? "Your turn," he told her.  
  
Soralis sighed. She didn't know how much to tell him. It wasn't that she didn't trust him; she just couldn't risk giving their captors any information that could be used against her people.  
  
"Essentially I am a demon-hunter. That is a person who hunts down evil extra-dimensional creatures and kills them before they can do any harm. Like you, I was investigating a torture-murder case. Unlike you, I found that this murder was only one of a string of twenty similar murders ranging across an entire continent. I traced these murders to a city where I learned that the murders were committed by a cult intending to open a portal into the Dead-Realms. This in turn would release a powerful and evil immortal into our Realm." She said.  
  
"Something went wrong," Qui Gon stated.  
  
Soralis smiled. "Very wrong. Before I found out where the cult was hiding, this evil immortal was released. Fortunately he was caught in a temporary time-space bubble on the edge of our Realm. This gave myself and a group of other demon-hunters enough time to locate the cult's hiding place and get there. On the way there, I was caught in a cave in and woke up here."  
  
"You said before you weren't a Jedi. So what are you?"  
  
"A lot of things," she said vaguely. "I really don't want to talk about it right now," she said softly. He got the hint. They were surely being monitored and she didn't want to reveal too much about herself to their captors. She looked at him. "Can you tell me what a Jedi is though?" she asked curiously.  
  
He frowned. "You don't know what a Jedi is? What planet are you from?" he asked seriously.  
  
"Earth. Terra to be more precise. Where that is from here, I have no idea." She replied.  
  
"Have you ever heard of a planet called Coruscant?" he asked. Even Rim- Worlders and those from Wild-Space knew of Coruscant, even if it was only in legend.  
  
She shook her head. "No."  
  
"Oh no," he whispered. That meant she was from a planet that was beyond even the most distant worlds and so far out into the Unknown Regions the Republic hadn't even made contact with her world yet.  
  
"Alright," he said and began to explain the basics, things even Morgan knew.  
  
***  
  
"What are they doing?" Morgan asked the rather bored guard monitoring an array of video monitors.  
  
"Standard get to know your cell-mate routine." He replied and laughed dryly. "Something they all go through one way or another. "  
  
Morgan echoed his laughter as she reviewed both the Jedi's and the alien's vital signs through an implant she had placed in their respective bodies while they had been unconscious.  
  
"He's reacting normally to the side-effects of the drugs. Strange." She said as she looked at the alien's vitals.  
  
"Her body is metabolizing the neuron inhibitor more quickly than I thought it would." She murmured. If the alien regained her ability to communicate to the symbiont that encased her skeletal structure, it would prove disastrous.  
  
"I'm going to have to increase the dosage." She said softly and grinned slightly. Two well-trained force-sensitives of different disciplines to play with. How delightful.  
  
The guard looked at her curiously. "What's so special about these two?" he asked.  
  
Morgan scowled at him. "Watch them. Even weakened Jedi are dangerous and we don't know what this alien is capable of."  
  
He blanched. "Jedi?" They were holding a Jedi captive? "My lady, is this wise?" he asked.  
  
She snorted. "Jedi are no different from any other being. They can be hurt and killed just like everyone else. Remember that." She turned around and left. 


	4. Chapt 4: Darkness Rising

Darkness Rising  
  
You can't change your destiny.  
  
A figure emerged from the darkness of the tunnel, looking at the scenes of recent chaos. He saw bodies littering the floor of the cavern, some bearing the marks of electricity damage, others of severe and sudden cold. It appeared there was stalemate.  
  
He pressed his palm to the floor of the cavern and images of the battle flickered in his mind. The attackers survived, only to see Shinnok escape. The figure pressed a hand to his head as if in pain. Then he walked on down the main tunnel.  
  
Here, there was a cave in. He instinctively knew it wasn't natural as he examined the rubble. He felt something familiar. Old blood and dark magic. He scowled. Somebody had been crushed by the rock; the body removed by magic.  
  
He looked at the rubble. Whoever it was had some purpose to taking the body. Then he knew. Prophet faded back into the shadows as others came to clear away the ruble. Then he was gone.  
  
***  
  
Obi-Wan sighed as he buried his face in his hands. He had delivered what he had to the Council and now he could only wait. His master was missing, Morgan Leigh had disappeared and he could do nothing but wait.  
  
Tahl looked at the boy and bent down, taking his hands in hers. "Obi-Wan we will not stop searching for Qui Gon. Morgan Leigh will not get away with this." She told him softly.  
  
Obi-Wan looked at her. She could see the tears in his eyes. "By the time we do find him, Morgan may have already killed him." He said.  
  
"Don't say that, don't even think it." Tahl admonished. "We'll find him. Don't loose hope,"  
  
***  
  
Soralis was chained hand and foot to one of the laboratory's walls. "If I were you, I wouldn't struggle." Morgan said as she strode in, flanked by two huge demonic guards. "If you try to escape, those cuffs can knock even you out." She said indicating the manacles that bound her to the wall.  
  
"Why are you doing this?" she asked, already knowing the answer. " We haven't done anything to you!"  
  
"You were placed into my care by an associate of mine. I was hired to break you my dear." Morgan replied as the guards stripped Qui Gon of his tunic, shoved him on the examination table and strapped him to it.  
  
"And what about him?" Soralis asked, desperately stalling for time.  
  
Morgan grinned at her. "For centuries the Jedi have been protectors of the Republic. No one knows much about them. I was too hasty with Jedi Knight Sitari and killed her too quickly. With Master Zanar Dun, I let my guard down and he managed to kill himself before I could stop him."  
  
She shrugged. "From what my associates tell me, you have a high pain threshold and can resist torture for a very long time." Morgan moved closer to Soralis. "I fear that Qui Gon does not share your experience in such matters. If you do not bend to my will, he will suffer."  
  
Soralis laughed harshly. "Do what you will. He means nothing to me,"  
  
"Liar. He means a great deal to you," Morgan snarled as she turned to the helpless Jedi.  
  
"Don't be afraid to use the force Qui Gon, it may be your only salvation," she said, mocking him.  
  
Qui Gon closed his eyes, refusing to answer her. He shivered as he heard the torture droid approach him and winced as he felt a needle prick his arm. Soralis screamed silently as she watched them torture her friend. Morgan smirked as she sat down at the monitor, secretly enjoying both of her prisoners' agony.  
  
Qui Gon was straining against the straps as the electro-jabber sent paralyzing jolts of energy through his body. The drugs that had been injected into him slowed down his time perception, so the torture seemed worse than it was. He screamed as the torture droid began using its pinchers to sear one of his hands.  
  
Soralis was lost, completely lost. The Jedi had mentally grabbed her mind in panic as the hallucinations began to take effect and this time, she couldn't turn away. With a physical effort she embraced Qui Gon's soul with her own and hoped they could ride the hallucinations and the physical torture out together.  
  
Morgan looked at the hovering torture droid. "Enough," she commanded it. It slowly retracted the acid jet it had been using to dribble corrosive acid on the Jedi's chest.  
  
She smiled as she examined the droid's work. It had extracted the maximum amount of pain from the bound man with only a little damage to his body, damage that could be easily healed. And they had only just begun to delve into the droid's full capabilities. She carefully went over his vitals. He was breathing rapidly, his heart rate was racing and he was drenched in sweat.  
  
She was curious. The alien's vital signs matched Qui Gon's almost exactly and yet nothing had been done to her. "This is quite interesting my dear, why does it seem that you are experiencing his pain?" Morgan asked as she walked over to Soralis.  
  
Soralis opened her eyes. "Why should I cooperate with you?" she asked the scientist softly.  
  
Morgan smiled and turned to Qui Gon, idly tracing her finger down his rib cage. He winced, expecting more punishment. "Consider this my dear. His lifespan corresponds directly to how long you are both useful to me."  
  
Soralis glanced at Qui Gon. He couldn't take much more of this. She glared at Morgan, sensing fear beneath that mask of detached amusement. She could smell something else, something quite familiar. "You have no idea what you are dealing with do you?" she said, rapidly changing the subject, hoping to get the bitch's attention away from Qui Gon.  
  
Morgan looked at her with a faint, twisted smile. "I know exactly what I am dealing with Soralis de Mordant." She waved her hand. "You are a creature of myth, something that should never have been born. A Pan-were and immortal, you stand for the innocent and the dead. You have powers that outstrip even the most accomplished of Jedi Masters. I will bring about what all the rest of the First Evil's servants have failed to do. I will turn you to darkness, or find a way to kill you."  
  
Soralis grinned. "That? That is nothing. You deal with powers that will consume you in the end. Shao Kahn will have your soul even if you do give him what he wants."  
  
Morgan went white with rage. How did this creature know about her dealings? The implants were designed to register Force-usage. "How do you know about this?  
  
"Did you honestly believe I wouldn't sense Outland taint on you?" she asked dryly.  
  
Morgan laughed. "Such a clever child. Your mind-games won't work with me," she turned to the droid. "Show her what we do to such clever children,"  
  
Soralis pressed herself against the wall as the torture droid drifted towards her, its over-large hypodermic needle filling with a viscous looking fluid. 


	5. Chapt 5: Destinies

Destinies  
  
Your fate is the only thing that can be changed…  
  
From the Harvester's Journal  
  
They were roughly tossed back into their cell and fell in a tangled heap. Qui Gon was the first to regain his senses and somehow managed to drag Soralis to her cot before he collapsed beside it. His mind was a confusing swirl of emotions, alien senses and images he had trouble comprehending. He could literally hear his friend's thoughts as loudly as if she had spoken them aloud.  
  
Memories, thousands of memories collided with his own, assailed him, he could only ride the wave, hoping he didn't drown in them. He knew they belonged to Soralis and what he saw, shocked and horrified him. He could sense her fighting something dark and twisted, something that sought entry into her own mind, even as it assaulted his own. Somehow, he leapt inward and instinctively sidestepped into a mental landscape that was both horrifying and captivating.  
  
He saw his friend, changed past all recognition into a huge, white bipedal feline, surrounded by a boiling black mist. Soralis turned to him, her gold eyes wide. "Qui Gon! Get out of here! You can't fight this!" she shouted.  
  
The black mist took the opportunity to attack, striking with red-edged black filaments that tried to enter her ears, mouth and nose. A bright flash of light blinded him and the mist seemed to recoil from the light, it's filaments burning away into harmless ash. It screamed, a high keening noise that brought him to his knees as it turned to him. He scrambled back, his mind blank with fear. Soralis shouted something in a language that was both alien and familiar. It shrieked again as an energy shield sprang up between him and the mist.  
  
As the black mist shattered the shield, Soralis launched herself at Qui Gon, tumbling both of them into a raging torrent of light and energy that he knew wasn't there before. They tumbled down the column of radiance into a chamber, a seat of calm in a barely controlled tornado. Qui Gon rubbed his head and looked around for Soralis. She was curled in a fetal position, moaning softly. She had somehow returned to her humanoid form during that wild tumble through chaos. He scrambled towards her and held her close to him.  
  
"Soralis? Come on, wake up. Wake up please. I don't know how to get us out of here. You have to wake up." He murmured.  
  
"Qui Gon?" she said, voice faltering. "What's happening to us?" she asked plaintively. She felt battered, inside and out, mental walls crumbling, shields that she spent years building falling down about her. Everything that she was, was now being shaken apart and she didn't know how to hold on.  
  
He rocked her slowly, holding her tight. "I don't know, I don't know." He told her frankly. He couldn't separate his mind and soul from hers and it frightened him as much as it frightened her. Qui Gon calmed himself, using an ancient technique dating back to before the Sith wars in order to do so. As he ordered his mind, he felt Soralis calming down as well. He frowned. There was only one possible way to keep them from both falling into insanity and evil and that meant using a technique so dangerous it was almost banned by the Council. But he had no choice.  
  
***  
  
Elsewhere in the complex, Morgan looked at the complex computer read-outs that monitored her two prized prisoners. She was incredibly lucky to get a hold of two such excellent subjects for her experiments, all for the price of breaking one stubborn alien female. She laughed to herself. It was all to her advantage and there was that additional promise of more subjects if she succeeded.  
  
They were powerful, confused and weakened. They had to use their abilities to survive and that would mean more data for her to analyze. As it was, the female alien's biology was such that it was a challenge to find the right drugs to sedate her properly without damaging her. She studied the monitors and watched as their heart-rate, blood-pressure and brainwaves slowed almost simultaneously.  
  
Morgan glanced at the view-screen. It showed Qui Gon sprawled on the floor beside the female's cot; both of them appeared unconscious. But Morgan knew better. They were doing something that involved the force.  
  
***  
  
Qui Gon closed his eyes, holding the Shadowlord as close to him as possible. He knew that they were in a mental safe-haven Soralis had created long ago, the colors that shielded them represented the auras she dealt with. Surprisingly, he found only a little of the colors which represented dark-side influence. He smiled. They would deal with that later.  
  
"Soralis, please listen to me. What I'm going to do will change us both forever. And I can't guarantee that we will survive it." he told her softly. "But it's the only hope we have of remaining sane."  
  
She gulped and nodded. "Do it. It's not as if we had a choice in the matter anyway."  
  
He brought his hand to her cheek, invoking the force at the same time. Around them, light and energy surged.  
  
***  
  
Obi-Wan staggered, almost falling against the wall as the force surged around him, unbidden, uncalled. Something familiar flavored the surge of power, something he knew well.  
  
//Master?\\ he queried, his eyes wide and blank as he searched for the source of that surge with his mind. It felt defuse, confused, as if his master was hurt or very, very far away.  
  
//Obi-Wan?\\ his master replied. //Thank god, it worked! Morgan Leigh has captured me. She's been imprisoning and torturing Jedi and other force- sensitives to death.\\  
  
//Where are you?\\ Obi-Wan asked desperately.  
  
//I don't know. Follow the invoices. Follow Morgan Leigh.\\ Qui Gon replied, sounding more distant.  
  
//Master!\\ Obi-Wan shouted as he heard Qui-Gon scream in pain. The connection was abruptly terminated. Obi-Wan slid down the wall of the temple, spent, confused and worried.  
  
***  
  
Soft laughter made Morgan turn. She smiled at the young, aristocratic man behind her. "So, did you stop them?" she asked indicating the view screen containing the images of her two prisoners.  
  
"Not before he managed to contact his apprentice." The man said bitterly. "He's much tougher than Zanar Dun or Sitari." He snorted. "But then, he would be with that thing to back him." He said pointing to Soralis.  
  
Morgan smiled tightly. "I think it's time for Phase Two." She said.  
  
He nodded in agreement. "Very well,"  
  
***  
  
Qui Gon was shaken, blasted into awareness by a harsh, grating wail that echoed and bounced off the walls of a huge natural cavern. He was between two stone pillars. Running from each of them were a pair of chains, ending in wrist and leg cuffs, binding him firmly in place. He shivered, realizing someone had removed his clothes. He gritted his teeth as the dissonant wail continued and wished he could cover his ears or do something to block out the sound. Abruptly, the sound ceased and he was left in blessed silence.  
  
"Poor Jedi. You have no idea what is going on do you?" a soft, eerily familiar voice whispered behind him.  
  
Qui Gon said nothing, still confused, unsure of his own senses. He was still recovering from the latest round of torture sessions Morgan had initiated, each one being more brutal and painful than the last. "More fun and games?" Qui Gon laughed dryly. "Why don't you just kill me and get it over with?" he asked.  
  
"Don't be so naïve Master Qui Gon Jinn. You know quite well we can't simply kill you. Not now," the man said as he stepped into view.  
  
The man was tall, almost as tall as Qui Gon, with an acrobat's whipcord lean build. He had sharp, angular features, short dark hair and dark green eyes. He was clad entirely in black. Qui Gon's eyes narrowed. Dangling from the man's utility belt was a lightsaber. In one hand was another cylindrical object similar to a lightsaber, but the design was entirely different from what he was used to. That face was familiar. It…  
  
"Xanatos," Qui Gon murmured, hiding his surprise behind a mask of indifference.  
  
"You know, the others didn't last as long as you have. Sitari was a disappointment. She died only after a few days. Master Zanar Dun, he lasted a bit longer. Maybe a week before he managed to kill himself." Xanatos lips twisted into a sick smile. "I suppose you've lasted longer because of that alien. She'll make a lovely Sith witch when she does break down, I think."  
  
Qui Gon smiled softly. "You overestimate your abilities Padawan," he said mockingly. "We've both survived worse. We'll survive this,"  
  
"I am no longer your apprentice Qui Gon, I ceased being your apprentice the moment you killed my father!" he said venomously.  
  
"I had no choice." Qui Gon replied quietly. "He would have destroyed billions in his bid for power. I could not allow it."  
  
Xanatos shook his head. "He was still my father. You betrayed me, destroyed everything I held dear." He said walking closer.  
  
"Curious about this?" he said suddenly, changing the subject; holding the cylindrical object in front of Qui Gon's face. "I noticed you were looking at it."  
  
Xanatos ignited it, and a long, narrow, writhing beam of energy cascaded from the terminus. "It's called an energy whip," he said, smiling that sick twisted smile.  
  
Qui Gon swallowed dryly, knowing what kind of damage an ordinary whip could inflict on a person; thanks to the memories Soralis had unwittingly shared with him when their mind-link first formed, no more than a few days ago. He didn't even want to think about the injuries that thing could cause. Qui Gon laughed inwardly. He would find out soon enough if his former Padawan had anything to do about it. And there was little he could do to stop him.  
  
Xanatos stepped back a pace. "I believe it is time to discuss the past don't you?" he laughed lightly. "You always did say we shouldn't let ourselves forget the past,"  
  
Qui Gon gazed at Xanatos steadily. "And I also said you shouldn't drown in it,"  
  
Xanatos glared back at him and abruptly moved behind him. Qui Gon's breath exploded from his lungs as Xanatos lashed him with the whip, the pain was sharp and intense. He could smell the scent of burning flesh and he realized it was his flesh burning. Qui Gon choked back a scream as the whip struck him again and again, sending waves of agony coursing through him.  
  
Elsewhere in the complex, Soralis stood in the cell; her pupils dilating 'till they all but obscured her irises. She could feel the waves of pain and guilt echoing down the mind-link she shared with Qui Gon. "Qui Gon, fight the son of a bitch!" she shouted. "Don't give in to him!"  
  
Qui Gon heard her shout. "Soralis?" he asked softly, raising his head, reaching out mentally to his friend.  
  
"Now, now, now," Xanatos said softly. "That's cheating," he remarked, lashing out psychically as he cracked the whip against Qui Gon's back as hard as he could.  
  
Qui Gon screamed, as a boiling red-laced black mist seemed to obscure his senses, locking him in a cage of pain and despair. He could feel the whip biting into his back, leaving a charred ruin in its wake every time it struck him. He fought as hard as he could against the mist and the pain, but slowly, ever so slowly; he wilted under the agony and despair.  
  
Soralis fell to her knees in shock as she felt her friend crumple under the pain, dying by degrees. She cried out in denial as she felt the final rush of energy that heralded his death. She could feel herself falling into the Harano or the dark sleep, a stupor of grief she knew she would never rise out of. Something kept her from that final, hopeless darkness. Something…  
  
Xanatos' eyes widened in shock as he saw the bluish light swirl around his dead former master, soaking into every pore, every orifice. As it soaked into Qui Gon's body, the charred red ruin that was his back healed from the inside out, until there was no sign of the injuries that killed him.  
  
Qui Gon gasped for air, his eyes blank with confusion. Xanatos flicked off the energy whip's beam and walked around till he faced the man. "Nice. Now I can kill you again and again. You can't escape, not even in death. You are mine now, totally and completely." He said, hiding his shock and sudden fear behind a mask of bravado.  
  
Qui Gon's eyes cleared and he glared at Xanatos. "Don't count on it," he spat.  
  
"Oh, but I am." Xanatos motioned for the guards to take Qui Gon down. They dragged the man to a stone table and shackled him to it with the stun-cuffs that were embedded conveniently in each corner. "We still have some issues between us to explore,"  
  
Qui Gon laughed dryly. He could sense his former Padawan's fear. The man was afraid of him. Perhaps he could use that to his advantage, if he could keep his wits about him. 


	6. Chapt 6: Edge of Insanity

Edge of Insanity  
  
When darkness rises, shadows fall first.  
  
From the Harvester's Journal  
  
Soralis stumbled, falling under Qui Gon, his weight pulling them both to the ground. The same guard that hurled him into the room trained a blaster on them as the other produced Qui Gon's clothing. Neither of the guards were taking chances. "I'd clean him up if I were you. I wouldn't want to live in his stench." One of the guards quipped as he tossed the clothing onto a cot.  
  
The other, a burly Keadyth demon laughed. "Then again, we can't stand how Jedi smell anyway," then they were gone.  
  
Soralis snorted. "They're a laugh riot, aren't they?" she asked Qui Gon; not really expecting an answer as she gently disentangled herself.  
  
"Oh damn, Qui Gon, what did they do to you? Drop you in a cess pit?" She said as she examined him, searching for any signs of damage. He was filthy; covered in dirt, sweat and dried blood. Other than that, she could find no evidence of any injuries.  
  
"I'm sorry," she whispered. "I'm so sorry," she said.  
  
His eyes flickered open. "Not your fault," he whispered. "Knew what I was getting into when I stabilized the link."  
  
"Maybe I should give in to them," she murmured. "Make an end of it for both of us,"  
  
Qui Gon reached up with an effort and gripped her hand. "No. As long as we're alive, we win. We can't loose hope," he told her firmly.  
  
"Alright," she replied as she helped him to his feet and half-supported, half-carried him to the small cubical that housed the cell's sanitary facilities.  
  
***  
  
As Xanatos walked into the corridor, another man joined him, appearing out of a side tunnel that led deep within the mountain complex. The man was tall, pale and dressed in strange, archaic armor. The man grinned at his younger associate. "Having fun with our guests?" he said.  
  
Xanatos glanced at him. "You might say that. Qui Gon is much tougher than I remembered. We should kill him before he becomes a threat to our plans."  
  
Quan Chi shook his head. "He has already formed a soul-link with Soralis. Killing him would prove fatal to her and we need her alive."  
  
Xanatos smirked. "All this trouble over one alien female. Why?"  
  
Quan Chi smiled. "She much more than that. She is the Isisethren, a creature that could lay waste to entire planets if she so chose. If we break her we can undo the spells that Osiris and his brood have wrapped around her over countless millennia. Once we do that, we will control that power."  
  
"And we must also keep her away from earth. As long as we have her, she cannot help Rayden. He will be acting alone, for no other god will lift a finger to help him in what they consider a family quarrel. Soralis could change that." He looked at the young Sith Lord pointedly. "Break the bitch. Time is running out."  
  
Xanatos bowed. "Yes, my lord. It will be done."  
  
***  
  
Obi-One didn't have time to react. A hand lashed out from the shadows behind him, snaking around his throat and covering his mouth and nose with a wet cloth. He struggled, breathing in the pungent fumes. He felt weak. As he collapsed, he could feel strong hands drag him somewhere, elsewhere. Then he lost consciousness.  
  
The boy woke slowly. His head ached dreadfully and his muscles felt stiff. He cracked open his eyes, seeing nothing but darkness. He almost panicked, but calmed once he realized that his eyes were working; it was only the room that was dark. As he sat up, the light levels brightened, revealing a being dressed from head to foot in unrelieved black sitting in a chair in front of his bed. The being's face was obscured by black silk cloth that was wrapped around his head, leaving only his eyes uncovered. And those eyes were an eerie, bright yellow.  
  
He eyed the being warily, knowing full well that he could not react quickly enough if the stranger decided to do something unpleasant. "Who are you?" he asked, wincing as pain shot through his head.  
  
The being slowly got up and moved over to a small kitchen unit. He returned with a glass of water and handed it to Obi Wan. He also pressed two small capsules into the boy's hand. "Take these. The sedative I gave you has a bad habit of causing headaches and dehydration."  
  
Obi Wan glared at him. "Why should I trust you?" he asked.  
  
The being folded his arms. "The headache that sedative causes can last for several days. You just will have to trust that those pills aren't something dangerous. Your choice of course." He sounded amused. "And it's quite difficult to concentrate with your head pounding."  
  
Obi Wan scowled. If the creature wanted to hurt him, he'd be pinned down on a torture-table right now instead of lying comfortably in a bed. And the headache was killing him. He shrugged and downed the tablets and water. "You kidnapped me. Who are you and who are you working for, Morgan Enterprises or Wolfram and Hart?" he asked.  
  
The being sat down on the chair again. "As to the first question, you can call me Prophet. And I am not working for either Morgan or Wolfram and Hart. If I was, you'd be very uncomfortable right now." He replied mildly.  
  
Obi Wan considered this. "True enough. So, why did you kidnap me?" he asked coolly, sensing that the creature meant no harm to him, at least, not yet. He could feel the headache receding, even as he spoke. So the pills really were painkillers.  
  
"I needed to talk to you."  
  
"Why should I cooperate with you?" Obi-One asked.  
  
"Because I can help you rescue your master." Prophet told him baldly.  
  
"What's the catch?" he asked warily.  
  
"In return, I would like you to help me rescue a former student of mine. I believe she is being held captive by the same individual who kidnapped your master."  
  
"Why didn't you go to the Brotherhood directly?" he asked.  
  
"I doubt very seriously that the Brotherhood would listen to me," Prophet said simply.  
  
"I'd like to help you, but I don't know where Morgan is holding my master, let alone your student." Obi-one replied truthfully. His instincts told him that this Prophet was not lying, nor was he evil. He frowned thoughtfully. Obi-one couldn't honestly say the being was good either.  
  
"I know where my student is being held. Chances are, Qui-Gon Jinn is being held with her. I need backup, in case something goes wrong. You can provide me with that."  
  
"How do you know where she is being held?" Obi-One demanded.  
  
Prophet sounded amused. "You'll just have to trust me. After all, you have no choice, not if you want to see your master alive. Morgan will never release him voluntarily. The only chance for his and my apprentice's survival lies in rescue. And you will help me, won't you?"  
  
Obi Wan glared at the creature. "You're right. I don't have a choice." He said. "I'll help you,"  
  
Prophet smiled to himself. He knew the boy would decide to help him. "Very well, this is what we shall do,"  
  
***  
  
Quan Chi scowled.  
  
Others had fallen under far less stress, for less reason. But these two…  
  
These two did not. It could not be tolerated. He looked at the shaft of light that held Morgan and smiled grimly to himself. The scientist was useful, annoying, but useful. He looked at her more closely. Too bad she wasn't his type.  
  
"What do you have for me?" he demanded, his voice echoing around her.  
  
Morgan peered through the bright light that nearly blinded her. "Their vital signs match almost exactly, which is strange considering that they are of opposite genders, come from different sides of the galaxy and have wildly different physiologies. Strangely enough, they appear to share some of the same genes," she paused as she held up a palm-device that showed a hologram depicting both Qui-Gon's and Soralis' genetic structure. Two points lit up, revealing a pair of strange genes that should not have been active, yet were.  
  
Quan Chi's eyes narrowed thoughtfully. "They are both mutants." He laughed lightly, amused. "This explains much."  
  
"It appears as if Qui-Gon's gene has activated just recently." Morgan added.  
  
Qui Gon smirked. "Indeed. There has been a change in plans,"  
  
"What?" Morgan asked confused.  
  
***  
  
Soralis wiped the sweat off of Qui Gon's brow, careful not to wake him. He was sleeping fitfully, trying to recover from the tortures Xanatos had inflicted on him. How long had they been prisoners? Days? Weeks? She had lost all track of time and it was an effort to simply survive on a day-by- day basis. She had almost given in to their captors a half dozen times, just to stop Qui Gon's torment. He had held her back each time. It was so easy to give in to anger, to despair and hate. But they did not; somehow they managed to keep their sanity intact.  
  
Qui Gon stirred as the energy field around their cell door flickered off. He woke as it opened, revealing Xanatos with two guards flanking him. "Go outside, I won't be needing you," he ordered the guards, who obeyed.  
  
"Xanatos," Qui Gon said.  
  
"Qui Gon," he acknowledged the prone Jedi and calmly and turned his attention to Soralis. "You should have turned Soralis. Now it's too late."  
  
"What do you mean?" she asked getting up from where she had been kneeling next to Qui Gon's bed.  
  
Xanatos smiled lightly. "Shao Kahn has completed your permanent residence in the Well of Souls. You will never be able to escape from there and he will complete what we have started."  
  
He looked at Qui Gon. "He has also expressed an interest in you, Master," he said sarcastically. "Since both of you are something of a package deal, we have agreed to sell you to Shao Kahn as well."  
  
Soralis could feel the blood drain from her face. "No," she said and leapt towards him.  
  
"Soralis, don't!" Qui Gon shouted as she caught the Sith Lord off-guard, knocking him to the floor.  
  
The guards rushed in, hearing Xanatos cry out in sudden fear. They converged on Soralis who had pinned Xanatos to the ground, preparing to rip his throat out with her bare hands. The guards, wielding force pikes, managed to wrestle Soralis away from Xanatos and barely managed to keep her at bay as he got up.  
  
He glared at the Shadowlord. "Some anger at last, how nice." He smirked. "Since we can't have you two escaping mid-route, we're going to put you on ice. I understand being frozen to death isn't particularly pleasant."  
  
The guards grinned as they clamped stun-cuffs on both Soralis and Qui Gon and hustled them out of the cell. They were taken deep within the complex and into a chamber. The chamber's walls were lined with computer banks and exposed pipes that led the center of the room. In the center of the room was a pair of human-sized, transparent tanks. Qui Gon swallowed as he saw Morgan finish inspecting the strange apparatus.  
  
"Is it ready?" Xanatos asked calmly.  
  
"Almost," she said as the guards shoved both Soralis and Qui Gon onto waiting chairs. Morgan strode casually over to Qui Gon, a large hypodermic needle in one hand, filled with a bluish fluid. Qui Gon fought the urge to shrink back and failed. "You're afraid of this my friend?" she asked as she stroked the side of his face with it.  
  
"Leave him alone!" Soralis shouted. Her shout was cut off by a surge of electricity from the stun cuffs that left her breathless and shaking with reaction.  
  
She glanced at the Shadowlord and smiled. "You really are stubborn, aren't you? As stubborn as your big friend here," she said, nodding to Qui Gon. "Not to mention cold. Any other female would have given almost anything to stop us from harming him, but not you."  
  
Qui Gon glared at Morgan. "It wasn't her decision to make." He said softly, striving for calm. "I would never ask her to give herself to you and your master, so you could use her as weapon against innocent people. We will never give in to you."  
  
Morgan whipped around, her face whitening with anger. "I am not a slave, I serve no one but myself." She said, backhanding him brutally across the face.  
  
Xanatos stood back, watching them in amusement. He knew what the two of them were trying to do. They were misleading their opponent, stalling for time. It was an old Jedi trick, one that worked almost every time.  
  
Soralis gulped for air, taking back control of the conversation. "You are a slave Morgan, a slave to Shao Kahn. He does not recognize mortals as equals. He only recognizes them as servants or enemies." She smiled humorlessly. "And you do not strike me as his enemy."  
  
She jerked her head to the security guards, two of which she easily recognized as demons. "He will destroy you in the end. A hell god can never be trusted. Neither can demons." The guard with the control to the stun- cuffs pressed a stud on it and she nearly choked as an intense surge of electricity raced through her body.  
  
Morgan smirked. "I can take care of myself. Save your concern for your friend and your own soul." She said as she viciously jabbed Qui Gon's exposed arm with the hypodermic needle.  
  
He cried out involuntarily as it was rammed into his arm. Morgan's eyes glittered as she watched the fluid drain out of the needle. She withdrew the needle, not bothering to stop the blood welling up from the puncture wound.  
  
"What did you do to him?" Soralis demanded, trying to get up from the chair. One of the guards hit her with his blaster, forcing her back into her seat.  
  
Morgan grinned as one of her aids handed her another similar looking hypodermic needle filled with the same bluish fluid. "I merely gave him some heavy duty sedatives to keep him quiet, some drugs that would affect his perception of time and a bit of hallucinogenic drugs as a farewell gift."  
  
Soralis glared at her. "You bitch," she hissed as Morgan injected her with the cocktail of drugs.  
  
"Yes, yes I am." She looked at the guards. "Put them in the tanks."  
  
Morgan watched as her two prisoners were tossed into their waiting tanks. "Even at the lowest temperatures, their regenerative powers will slow down the effects of hypothermia. It could take a few days for them to succumb to the cold."  
  
"No hurry," Xanatos laughed. "Shao Kahn has waited three hundred years for this. He can wait a bit longer." He moved over to the tank holding Qui Gon.  
  
"No more games Master." Xanatos said, smiling. "Your final destiny awaits,"  
  
Qui Gon looked at Xanatos. "Don't do this," he whispered. "There is still hope for you,"  
  
"You're right." Xanatos agreed. "But there isn't any hope for you." He walked away.  
  
Qui Gon closed his eyes in despair as the hallucinations began. Again. And this time, he would not wake up from them. 


	7. Chapt 7: Defeat

DEFEAT  
  
No one can exist without balance…  
  
Obi Wan looked at the planet through the cloaked, highly modified freighter's view-screen. The planet itself was located on the very edge of known space and very little was known about it.  
  
It was the perfect place to stash prisoners or conduct questionable experiments. There was no real reason why any officials would want to visit this world and anyone trying to escape from it would find a harsh, inhospitable climate that would quickly destroy them.  
  
Underneath the nearly sterile atmosphere of the planet, Obi Wan felt a rippling disturbance in the force, flavored with a sense of evil, pain, hopelessness and death. He shivered. If his Shadowlord companion could be trusted, his master was at the center of that disturbance.  
  
Prophet looked at the boy and smiled to himself. He had a great deal of potential. It was a pity no Shadowlord had picked him up as an apprentice. Prophet shrugged inwardly. At least the Jedi had recognized that potential and didn't let it go to waste. He only hoped Obi Wan was strong enough to confront Quan Chi's evil.  
  
"Get ready," he told the boy softly. "We're going in,"  
  
"What's down there?" Obi Wan asked as they descended through the planet's atmosphere.  
  
"A nightmare beyond imagination," he replied quietly.  
  
***  
  
Qui Gon was shoved against one of the laboratory's walls and held there as Morgan's guards shackled him to it. One of the guards brutally slammed his head against the wall, leaving him momentarily stunned. He heard the sounds of scuffling and opened his eyes, seeing his apprentice in the grip of two guards. Qui Gon's stomach clenched in fear and nausea. They had managed to capture the boy after all.  
  
"No!" Qui Gon screamed as the guards savagely ripped Obi Wan's clothes off and strapped him down on the examination table, despite the boy's frantic attempts to get away. "Oh god, leave him be. Please!" Qui Gon begged as one of the guards viciously backhanded him, silencing him.  
  
Another person came in through the laboratory's only doorway. This being was cloaked and hooded, obscuring his or her features. Hovering at shoulder height was a torture droid. Qui Gon pressed his back against the wall as the figure walked over to him and flung back the hood. His eyes widened in shock.  
  
"Tahl?" he said, recognizing his old, dear friend.  
  
But it wasn't Tahl. Not the Tahl he remembered. She smiled as she lightly, teasingly stroked the side of his face. He shuddered. "Tahl let me go. Let us go, please." He begged her softly.  
  
Tahl smiled again, only this time, her smile was more predatory and evil. She moved over to the bound boy who shrank away in fear. Tahl looked over her shoulder. "You should have turned Qui Gon. Now it's too late," she said as the torture droid drifted over the boy, it's over-large hypodermic needle filling with fluid.  
  
The boy cried out as it jabbed him with the needle, injecting him with a variety of nasty drugs designed to lower pain thresholds, slow down the perception of time and create horrible hallucinations whenever the interrogator spoke a few trigger words.  
  
Qui Gon strained against the shackles binding him to the wall, trying to get to the boy. But it was useless. Tahl had turned; his apprentice was dying in front of him. Despair and pain overwhelmed him, drowning out the sights and sounds in front of him. He had lost and was lost in the darkness. And he could not escape. Ever.  
  
Soralis too, was lost. She was in a maze that constantly shifted around, offering no escape. Screams echoed around her, screams of people in pain and people dying badly. Hands, rotting from some unknown disease reached out from the ground beneath her feet and from the very walls; snatched at her clothing and her hair.  
  
She stumbled on, avoiding the hands as best as she could, while trying to block the sounds of the screaming with her own hands. Abruptly, the ground gave away from her and she tumbled down a dank, sloping tunnel, falling into a hole, an oubliette really.  
  
She was unhurt, but stunned, afraid and completely alone. She couldn't even Qui Gon's comforting presence in the back of her mind anymore. She frantically searched for it, but found only darkness, a wall of darkness between her and him. She drew her knees to her chest, hugging them tightly as she rocked back and forth, lost in a wave of misery and despair.  
  
The air around her shimmered, growing cold, bitterly cold. Two figures emerged from the shadow, one in the black cloak and hood of a Jedi Master, the other in the brown cloak of a Jedi Knight.  
  
The Jedi Knight threw back her hood, revealing a grim-faced female with short black hair. She knelt down before the nearly catatonic Shadowlord and cursed softly. "Are we too late?" her black-cloaked companion asked her softly.  
  
The female Knight took Soralis' chin in her hand and examined her worriedly. "I don't know. Xanatos has her wrapped up in so many spells, I can't feel her." she looked at her companion. "Help me Zanar. We don't have any time to spare." The Jedi Master knelt down. Around them, the air shimmered blue with energy.  
  
***  
  
They had easily penetrated the planet's defenses, landing some five kilometers away from the mountain complex. Now, they were traveling deeper into the mountain, on foot. "This is too easy," Obi Wan murmured to his companion.  
  
"The predator doesn't expect to be hunted in his own den," Prophet replied dryly as he stopped at a particular, shielded door.  
  
The Shadowlord knelt, placing the palm of his hand flat on the floor next to the door. His skin crawled as he felt the raw evil, helplessness and pain that had seeped into the earth. "They were here," he hissed, his voice roughening with worry and barely contained rage. "Come on. We don't have much time." He told the boy. Together, they raced down yet another passageway.  
  
***  
  
Xanatos sat cross-legged in the middle of the chamber. The walls were carved with strange symbols and glyphs. His eyes opened as he felt a strange stirring in the force. He smiled to himself. Qui Gon was well and truly lost in the hallucinations. He hoped every last moment the elder Jedi spent alive in that tank was one of torment. He frowned. Soralis should have been as lost as Qui Gon. Yet she wasn't. He would have to deal with it.  
  
***  
  
Prophet skidded to a halt in front of another, closed door. He swiped a strange crystal-like card over the retinal scan. The card glowed softly, revealing odd runes embedded in its crystalline matrix. The door silently slid open. Obi Wan followed the man into the room and stopped short.  
  
The room was a huge laboratory, filled with equipment of every sort. He swallowed as he saw his master floating in a tank. Beside him, in a companion tank was a white haired woman. Both his master and the woman were thin, too thin. It was as if they hadn't been given enough to eat, or just enough to eat to keep them alive. Both were pale, their lips blue with cold. He couldn't feel either his master's or the woman's mental presence. They were completely walled away by a thick layer of dark-side energy. He ran to a monitor. "Oh no." he whispered. "We got to get them out of there. It's –29 degree's Celsius." He looked at Prophet. "They're freezing to death."  
  
Prophet snarled as he ran to the tanks. He touched the crystal-like surface of Soralis' holding tank. The young Shadowlord's eyes were open, staring blankly into nothing. "No," he whispered as he clenched his fist.  
  
"Prophet, someone's coming," Obi Wan hissed. Prophet's whirled around and yanked the boy behind a bank of equipment.  
  
The door swished open, revealing a tall, black-haired young man. Obi Wan's eyes widened as he recognized Qui Gon's former apprentice. Xanatos drew his cloak around him as he stood in front of the tanks. "Why don't you just die?" he asked his unresponsive captives.  
  
"I know you can hear me Soralis. Quit fighting. The longer you live, the longer Qui Gon remains in torment." He touched the tank holding Qui Gon, idly stroking the surface.  
  
Prophet clamped a hand over Obi Wan's mouth, preventing him from crying out as the dark-side energy around Xanatos flared. Qui Gon jerked in response, his eyes opening wide and his face twisting in agony.  
  
Xanatos smiled as he felt the pressure on the spells he had placed around her subside. "You don't get it do you?" he told Soralis. "You've lost," he turned and left.  
  
Prophet held the trembling boy tightly, waiting until he could no longer feel the Sith's presence close by. He let Obi Wan go. "Come on," Prophet said as he pulled Obi Wan to his feet. He walked over to the bank of computers and placed a blue, crystal-like device on top of it. The crystal began to glow, bathing the computer in a bluish radiance.  
  
"What's that?" Obi Wan asked as he ignited his lightsaber.  
  
"Jamming device. It's essentially telling the rest of the complex that those two are still under ice," He grimaced at the turn of phrase and then he took out a cylindrical object from under his cloak.  
  
Obi Wan jumped back a pace as he recognized it for what it was. Prophet moved towards Soralis' tank, the lightsaber in his hand coming to life. He swiftly cut a hole in Soralis' tank, catching her and gently lowering the younger Shadowlord to the floor. Obi Wan followed suite and cradled his master's head in his lap.  
  
"What's wrong with them?" he asked as Prophet took a small palm-sized medical scanner out of his pouch and took a reading on both Soralis and Qui Gon.  
  
He cursed. "Drugs. A lot of Bevo Six, Tridium, Xyrix Nine and some other drugs and compounds the scanner can't identify."  
  
Obi Wan's eyes widened in shock. "Those are illegal!" he hissed.  
  
Prophet snorted as he fished out a couple of vials filled with clear liquid. "Here, this is Gaia's Tears. Give it to your master. All of it." he said as he uncorked one of the vials and poured the liquid into Soralis' mouth. She swallowed it instinctively.  
  
Obi Wan did the same, and watched as strange liquid began to take an almost immediate effect. Qui Gon began coughing and shivering uncontrollably as Gaia's Tears rapidly purged his body of the foul drugs Morgan had injected him with. Obi Wan felt the force surge around him as he felt his master stir.  
  
"No…" his master mumbled, still lost in the last vestiges of the all-too- real nightmare the drugs had inflicted on him. "Leave…Let…"  
  
Obi Wan almost cried, hearing how lost and defeated his master sounded. "Master! Wake up, please. Wake up. You're free. You're free!" he said, shaking him gently  
  
Qui Gon opened his eyes, wincing in pain. His eyes widened as he saw the boy, alive, free and more importantly, healthy. "Obi Wan?" he said, surging up, wincing as his muscles protested, dismayed at how weak he felt. "Go, go away now!" Qui Gon told him firmly, his mind reeling with shock and elation. Obi Wan was alive and here in the laboratory. If Xanatos and Morgan got their sick, twisted hands on his Padawan… Qui Gon's stomach clenched in nausea. They would not. He would not let them.  
  
"Not without you," Obi Wan told him just as firmly.  
  
Qui Gon shook his head, clearing it. Memory surged. "Soralis! Where?"  
  
"She's over there," Obi Wan said, helping his master to his feet.  
  
Prophet held Soralis while the Tears of Gaia took effect, destroying the spells around her and the purged the harmful drugs from her system. She opened her eyes and he tensed. They were not the normal pale gold he was used to. Instead, they were black, completely black, drowning out both her irises and the whites of her eyes. Two points of boiling green energy took the place of her pupils. "Soralis?" he questioned.  
  
"It's alright," she said. Her voice was strange, deeper, more menacing. "She's busy at the moment." Soralis stood and looked around.  
  
Prophet scrambled to his feet, igniting his lightsaber at the same time. "Who are you?" he said, standing between her and the two Jedi.  
  
Soralis or whoever it was possessing her laughed. "Don't be dense," she said. "You will need my help in order to get out of here alive."  
  
"Prophet, it's alright." Qui Gon said softly. "It's her symbiont. Soralis is fine. She's slowing Xanatos down."  
  
The symbiont nodded. "Yes,"  
  
"You'll give back her body when this is over, right?" Prophet stated quietly.  
  
"Of course. We must obey her and then protect her." The symbiont replied as Soralis' body blurred. Between one heartbeat and another, a huge, white tiger took her place. In another heartbeat, a black metallic substance boiled out of her skin, encasing the tiger in skin-tight armor. The tiger that was Soralis stepped gravely towards Qui Gon. "Get on. You do not have the strength to run very far." It noted dryly.  
  
Prophet snarled quietly as he watched the tiger kneel, letting Qui Gon get on. The black metal shivered, expanding to cover the Jedi from the waist down. Prophet looked at the boy who stood frozen with fascination. "Come on, we don't have all day." Together, the fugitives snuck out of the laboratory.  
  
***  
  
Something was happening. The spirit of Sitari motioned for Zanar Dun to back away as she did the same. Bright green light surrounded Soralis and moved around her like a tornado as it was sucked into her. She stood, awareness and intelligence seeping back into her eyes and face.  
  
"Thank you," she said gratefully. "Whoever you are, thank you." She looked at them curiously, knowing quite well that they were dead. She also knew that they were in some sort of prison within her mind. She could feel the connection to her symbiont return to full strength and the wall around Qui Gon dissolve, leaving them both free. With those connections and her powers largely restored to her, she quickly found her own mental equilibrium.  
  
Sitari and Zanar Dun bowed. "We are the Jedi whom Morgan and Xanatos tortured and killed, drawing Qui Gon into this mess. Now that the spells around you are destroyed, Xanatos will not hesitate to kill both you and your mind-mate." Zanar Dun told her as he straightened.  
  
Soralis nodded in agreement. "I take it you're trapped here even in death, right?"  
  
Sitari smiled slightly. "Yes my lady. Only you can free us. Only we can help you escape."  
  
Soralis smiled in return. "Of course." She said, her eyes clouding, momentarily distracted.  
  
"My lady?" Zanar Dun asked, concerned.  
  
"It's alright. Come on, we have to slow Xanatos down. My symbiont will insure that Qui Gon and I escape in the physical world." She said as she held out her hands.  
  
Sitari and Zanar Dun gripped them. The green glow intensified, drowning out the darkness in its radiance. Then they were gone, free of the oubliette Xanatos had created to hold Soralis for eternity.  
  
***  
  
Xanatos ran down the corridor, closely followed by a contingent of soldiers. He was seething with rage. Somehow, someway, Qui Gon and his bitch of a mind-mate had managed to overcome all of his spells, all of the coercions he had so carefully placed around them and now, they were free. This could not be tolerated. He growled softly.  
  
"My lord, Qui Gon and Soralis are in the southern tunnels leading to the outside," a voice crackled on his comm-link. "They are not alone."  
  
"I know. We're on our way. Get the Indicator ready, just in case we fail to capture them on-planet. Their rescuers must have some sort of transportation nearby." He snapped back. He looked at his handpicked squadron of demons, droids and humans, all of them the best his own master could afford. He hoped they would be enough to stop Qui Gon, Soralis and whoever rescued them.  
  
He skidded to a halt as he felt a stirring in the force. Something huge slammed into his shields and incandesced, making his own troops back away in fear. A huge, ghostly, predatory bird hovered near the roof of the tunnel, hissing and shrieking loudly. On either side of the bird were two glowing orbs of energy. They peeled away and shot down the tunnel, faster than he could follow with his eyes, so fast; he almost doubted they existed at all. With a start of recognition, he realized that the bird was Soralis.  
  
Soralis bobbed up and down, banking left and right, teasing, taunting the Sith in her wonderfully nasty owl's voice. She dove under a furious blast of lightening Xanatos leveled at her and returned the favor by changing the rock in front of him to molten lava. She easily deflected the blaster fire the guard's rained on her, killing several in the bargain and made feints at Xanatos, daring him to strike her.  
  
He snarled furiously at the wheeling bird, realizing that she wasn't trying to kill him, just delay him. And she was doing a fairly good job at it. Every step they took cost precious moments, moments that could have been spent reaching their quarry and stopping them. He glared at her. Time to change tactics.  
  
***  
  
Zanar Dun and Sitari wheeled and dove down, deep within the complex, spurred on by the influx of power they had received from just being near Soralis. Somewhere, deep within the mountain was Quan Chi, a great and evil sorcerer who had engineered the whole mess. They had found this out to their sorrow and death and were determined to shut down whatever magicks he may have in his chambers.  
  
They coalesced in his chambers as full body apparitions, both of them glowing bright blue in response to the darkness the room contained. They both realized that Quan Chi had not been in his rooms for some time. It didn't matter. They began to methodically demolish the place anyway.  
  
***  
  
It was a running battle. They eluded many of their would-be captors, but in the end, they faced a brace of demons and droids just as they reached last tunnel that led to the outside.  
  
Prophet and the boy fought side by side, flanking the tiger and Qui Gon, who was fighting just to stay conscious. The symbiont's metallic skin shivered, producing dozens of impossibly fast chains tipped with a variety of sharp implements that hacked and slashed its opponents into unrecognizable chunks.  
  
Obi Wan ducked under a demon's wild charge, using the thing's momentum to send him crashing into a destroyer droid while Prophet sent two droids crashing into another huge pit demon. While the demon was distracted, the Shadowlord neatly cut his head off with his lightsaber.  
  
Then they were quickly fitting breathing masks over their faces. Obi Wan turned to his master and was surprised to see him slumped completely over the shoulder of the huge armor-clad tiger. The symbiont's flesh oozed over the unconscious Jedi, enveloping him completely.  
  
/Move! Soralis is on the run, she can't hold Xanatos back!\ the symbiont hissed in his mind as it leapt forward, following Prophet. Obi Wan shuddered, flicked off his 'saber and raced after them.  
  
***  
  
Soralis raced out of the complex, followed by two glowing balls of energy and what seemed like an entire legion of soldiers headed by a furious, singed Xanatos. Soralis and her companion orbs were only meters ahead of the army when they caught sight of Prophet's star freighter. They saw their fellow fugitives race up the gangplank before Soralis folded her wings and dove straight through the freighter to her own body and collided with it. The two orbs followed, taking shelter within her mind.  
  
***  
  
Obi Wan watched as the tiger sank to the ground. The black metallic stuff enveloping both his master and the cat withdrew back into the cat's body as the gang-plank lifted, closing them off from the planet's harsh elements. Obi Wan gently dragged Qui Gon off the tiger and laid him on the ground. "Master?" he asked softly as the star freighter lifted off.  
  
Qui Gon's eyes flickered open. They were haunted, but clear of the drug haze Obi Wan had seen before. "I knew you would come Padawan," he whispered.  
  
Obi Wan smiled through a haze of tears as he hugged the exhausted Jedi. 


	8. Chapt 8: Escape

Escape  
  
Dreams are a window to a reality few care to tread….  
  
1 From the Harvester's Journal  
  
The small freighter was rocked by blasts as it raced through the planet's thin atmosphere. A thick cloud of snub-nosed star-fighters chased it, headed by Xanatos. Obi Wan helped both Soralis and Qui Gon to the freighter's bridge, where they all quickly strapped themselves in.  
  
Obi Wan's attention was caught between the fighters and the two he had just helped rescue. His master had already lapsed into unconsciousness and the woman wasn't in much better shape. She seemed to be staring at nothing and was almost catatonic.  
  
"Go, get to the quad-guns." Prophet ordered, almost snarling. Obi Wan nodded and hastily ran to the ship's main weapon's array.  
  
He quickly strapped himself into the chair and placed the targeting visor over his eyes, just as the first star-fighters came into range.  
  
Soralis was rigid. Visions danced in her mind, cascading one over the other. A Star-gate set in a marble temple; a valley city. Meydum. A promise of safety. Numbers danced in her mind as her hands moved of their own volition over the navigation computer's controls.  
  
***  
  
Xanatos grinned as he ordered the Indicator to close in on the fugitive freighter while he and his fighters kept the ship bottled up. The star- fighters closed in on the freighter in a thick, intimidating cloud. "Aim for their engines and weapons-array. I need the passengers alive," he warned.  
  
***  
  
Prophet cursed as the sensors wailed. "Obi Wan, Indicator closing in. Give me some room to maneuver!" He looked at his passengers and cursed again. Soralis was entranced, her hands flying over the navigation-computer's controls programming it in a way he had never seen before.  
  
"Understood." Obi Wan shot back. "I hate flying," he muttered as the fighters closed in. He gripped the firing controls and began to decimate the cloud of star-fighters.  
  
***  
  
The Captain of the Indicator, a ship capable of generating a field, which could prevent another ship from entering hyperspace, grinned in triumph. "How much longer until the disruption-field generator is on-line?" he asked the technician beside him.  
  
"Not much longer Captain." A sensor chirped on his control-panel. "Ah, there we go," the technician said calmly. "Sir, the field has been activated."  
  
"Excellent. Open a channel to our friends out there," The captain replied.  
  
"Channel opened," the computer remarked.  
  
"Unidentified freighter. You are trespassing on Federation space. Lower your shields and prepare to be boarded. You can't escape."  
  
***  
  
"Federation space, right." Obi Wan muttered as he blew up another fighter who stupidly got into laser range. The ship's sensors wailed again. "What is it now?" he shouted into his comm-link.  
  
"They just initiated the hyperspace field disruptor!" Prophet shouted back as he maneuvered the ship between two star fighters who couldn't pull up fast enough to avoid running into each other. Prophet grinned wolfishly to himself. They wouldn't find this ship easy to take.  
  
***  
  
Dozens of possible futures flickered in her mind's eye, each one less attractive then the last. Soralis' hands flew over the controls, making countless adjustments. Zanar Dun and Sitari looked on, invisible to the others and all too aware of the Indicator no more than half a solar system away.  
  
/They'll never make it.\ Zanar said worriedly. /Come on.\  
  
Sitari took his hand and the two of them vanished, only to reappear in the Indicator's engine room. Surrounded by a powerful shield less than an atom thick was a column of energy, sending waves of dissonance into hyperspace. Zanar and Sitari began to glow, funneling energy into the field disruptor; overloading it.  
  
***  
  
Prophet banked and wheeled his ship as Obi Wan cleared a path for him, demolishing fighter after fighter. He knew quite well that Xanatos was flying just out of range, ordering his troops to delay and confuse them. It was a fairly good tactic, one that was working all too well. He jerked forward in his seat as the ship shuddered.  
  
"What's going on?" he shouted into his comm-link.  
  
"Tractor beam!" Prophet shouted. "They have us in a tractor beam," he said as his hand strayed towards the self-destruct button. He wouldn't let Xanatos take the ship. Better dead, then dark. He told himself as he closed his eyes. Better dead, then a slave.  
  
Xanatos grinned in self-satisfaction. He'd kill the veiled man slowly, and then turn the boy. As for his two former "guests" he would strip every sense of identity from them until they could no longer even dream of escape. He jerked in pain as the force shrieked around him, drawing his attention to the Indicator.  
  
A fireball of incandescent energy erupted out of the engine room as the hyperspace disruptor exploded, the shockwave moving outward too fast for the engineers to escape or prevent it from enveloping the ship. Xanatos' eyes widened in horror as his precious Indicator was incinerated.  
  
Soralis' hands flew over the navigation computer's controls, initiating the hyperspace sequence. As Prophet finally realized what she was doing, the ship was catapulted into hyperspace. Soralis slumped forward, only to be caught by Prophet before she hit the console in front of her. 


	9. Chapt 9: Meydum

Meydum

**First rule of dealing with demons: Never let them intimidate you.**

                                                                        From the Harvester's Journal 

Soralis floated in a luminous gray fog. Nothing hurt. It was a pleasure simply to drift, to be free of pain, of thought. She slept. 

Voices woke her. Angry voices and the sounds of scuffling. She opened one eye, and saw the blurred image of a humanoid bending over her, examining her. She couldn't move, couldn't speak. Soralis could feel herself being lifted, shifted onto something flat and hard. She felt tired, weak. Her eyes fluttered closed.

Soralis could smell the scent of hundreds of humans and water. It had rained recently. She could smell flowers and greenery. Then she smelled the acrid scent of antiseptic, a scent she associated with hospitals and…

She struggled, lashing out in panic. She wouldn't go back to Morgan's complex. She wouldn't face…She felt a sharp sting on her arm, warmth and darkness flowed from the puncture, enveloping her, taking away thought and consciousness.

***

Soralis drifted in the darkness, not really aware of anything, just enjoying the fact that she didn't feel much of anything. She couldn't say how long she drifted, or where she drifted to, she didn't really care.

"Are you aware of the kind of potential you posses?" a voice asked from behind her.

Soralis turned around. They were in some sort of courtyard, surrounded by vast gardens. She could hear running water somewhere and smell the scent of night-blooming flowers. Overhead, the star-studded night-sky was dominated by a huge, full moon. The owner of the voice she heard, the only other being in the courtyard, was sitting on the rim of a gurgling fountain. 

The man was tall. Standing up, he would be taller than Qui Gon, probably close to seven feet. He had graying, shoulder length black hair, black eyes and a neatly trimmed beard. He was dressed in black robes richly embroidered with silver thread. She frowned. The evil emanating from the man surrounded him like a thick cloud. Yet, she sensed no malice, no threat. Not yet at any rate.

She shrugged. "Never bothered me."

The man smiled, looking at her knowingly. "Really?" he asked as he stood up; walked over to her.

"You are constantly at the beck and call of some god or power greater than yourself, yet…" he shook his head. "Yet in truth, you could be greater than any of them."

Soralis laughed. "Right. And I know this nice little bridge you can buy in San Francisco. There's always gonna be somebody more powerful than you. Always."

 The man considered this and dismissed it. "Maybe. You could still be greater than you are now. Yet, you passed up countless chances to reach for that power."

"Who are you?" she demanded. "Why are you here?"

"I think you know. As to your other question. You drew me here." He grinned. "Blood calls to blood. Bone to bone." He quoted.

Soralis' eyes narrowed. "Shinnok. You are Shinnok."

His smile widened. "Yes. You catch on quickly. The mark of a Shadowlord, I presume."

She smirked. "The mark of anyone with half a spoonful of brains."

He scowled. "You are as flippant as your father. And as disrespectful."

"I take that as a compliment, coming from you." She shot back. "What do you want from me?"

Shinnok laughed harshly. "You are Gaia's champion. The only PanWyre to be born in countless millennia. Her mark is upon you and I offer you a choice granddaughter. Kill Rayden; destroy him. Or watch Earth perish in blood and fire." 

"Get bent and see if it brings forth enlightenment." Soralis snapped.

Shinnok snarled, whipping his arm up, intending to slap her, to bring her to heel. Soralis blocked him, catching his hand in her fist. "Don't. You won't like the result. I'm not my father. Family ties don't mean anything to me. Fuck with me, threaten my planet and I'll bury you. I'm through being nice grandfather."

He looked at her hard, then smiled, easily wrenching his arm out of her hand. "Well. You certainly have guts. When you finally do turn, I will enjoy having you at my side." Power flared around him and then he was gone.

*** 

Colonel Jack O'Neil dove behind a pile of rocks as laser fire erupted around him. Ranged around the Stargate chamber was his team consisting of Samantha Carter, the Jaffa Warrior Teal'c and Daniel Jackson. All of were taking cover behind whatever they could find. 

"Teal'c, I thought you said Saqqara was a friendly planet!" Jack shouted as he grabbed a fallen Jaffa spear and leveled a barrage of laser fire on the oncoming Jaffa warriors.

"It was! Sethos took it over!" Teal'c shouted back as Daniel located the Stargate control panel. 

"Big news flash," O'Neil grumbled. "Daniel, hurry up with that thing!" he screamed.

"On it!" Daniel shouted back.

With a rumble and whoosh, the Stargate activated and the foursome dove through. The Jaffa guards raced into the room, only to be stymied as the 'gate deactivated.

***

He was back, back in the darkness, frozen in a terrifying thread of insanity. Though purged of the drugs and healed of the injuries he had sustained in captivity, his body remembered, his mind could not let go. He was trapped.

Cold. He was cold, freezing. Frost clouded the clear plastisteel walls of the suspension tank, where he floated helpless in the freezing air. Each breath was like a dozen icy shards ripping apart his throat. Colder laughter floated around him.

"Not so brave are we?" Morgan asked, dropping the temperature down another degree. Qui Gon shivered miserably. 

"Why do you still resist? The Council won't lift a single finger to save you. They've already abandoned you. No one will rescue you. No one will save you. You are mine Qui Gon."

He shook his head rapidly, each movement sending new waves of pain down his already bruised and battered body. No. Nononono. He thought grimly, refusing to believe her. He opened his eyes. "Never," he whispered, barely opening his mouth.

"Idiot." Morgan hissed. "You damned idiot."

The collar around his throat hummed to life, sending blinding waves of unrelenting agony coursing through his body. He screamed, his cries echoing in the suspension chamber, deafening him. And still, still the agony continued, until blessed unconsciousness claimed him.

***

Qui Gon woke slowly, taking in his surroundings one sense at a time. He was lying on something soft, much softer and more comfortable than the cot in the cell he shared with his mind-mate, Soralis. He was covered in a light, silken sheet. He smelled antiseptic, flowers and free-flowing water. 

More welcoming still, he could smell fresh air, not the flat, recycled stuff he had become used to breathing in. He could hear the soft murmur of machinery and the sound of birdsong. He didn't feel any pain, no lingering headaches, nothing. He felt free, freer than he had since his capture. He could….

His eyes flew open. "Obi Wan!" he whispered. The boy was sitting on a chair next to his bed. The boy straightened and smiled.

"Master! You're awake!" he said as he hugged the man tightly.

***

"So, you let them escape. You had them in your grasp and you let them escape." Quan Chi stated calmly.

Xanatos knelt, bowing his head, knowing full well he had failed. "I am sorry my master. I do not know how it happened. One minute they were being pulled in by the Indicator and the next minute it exploded."

Quan Chi smirked. "Soralis." He murmured. "It must be. Only she would have that amount of destructive power in her possession."

Xanatos raised his head, confused. "How my master? She was purposely kept weak, off-balance and near the edge of collapse for the entirety of her captivity." 

Quan Chi chuckled dryly as he paced. "The bitch has more tricks up her sleeve than you know boy. We need her and Qui Gon Jinn back alive."

"We don't know where she has gone my lord." Xanatos replied softly.

"But we know where she will be going, apprentice." Quan Chi said.

"Where?" Xanatos asked.

"Her home. Earth. She is very single minded in her purpose. All guardian spirits are."

"I will prepare for our journey my lord," Xanatos replied softly.

***

The white haired woman was tossing and turning, mumbling something in a language the young healer-priest couldn't understand. Her face was ghostly white, her brow beaded with sweat. As she went to check the woman's pulse, a strong hand lashed out from under the covers. The woman was glaring at her, pale gold eyes fixated blindly on her face.

The healer-priest cried out in fear and from behind her another priest helped her pry the woman's hand from her wrist. The healer-priest looked at the older priest who saved her and whitened. She murmured something incoherent and fled.

Soralis' eyes cleared, the nightmare fading to a nasty stain in the back of her mind. She found herself in some sort of medical ward, heavy on ancient Egyptian motifs. She was comfortable, clean and more importantly free from pain. 

As her eyes cleared, she saw a woman looking at her. The woman appeared to be in her late twenties and had the classical features of ancient Egyptian royalty. She was dressed in a flowing white robe heavily embroidered with gold thread. To further this image, a bright gold circlet circled her head, etched with the symbols of a falcon, whose claws enclosed a throne and a sun disk.

"You never did like medical wards very much. I see that has never changed." The woman said dryly in ancient Egyptian as she gracefully sat down on a nearby chair.

"Lady Isis?" Soralis said, her mind blurring the past and present in a confusing whirl.

"So you remember, amazing." She cocked her head. "From what the boy told us, I'm amazed you wits are still about you." 

"You know about…" Soralis trailed off, shaking her head.

"Yes. You are the Isisethren." Isis smiled slightly. "And my daughter, if you want be literal, though you are no Ga'ould. And I suspect your body would reject any attempt at being made into one." She looked at the dazed Shadowlord. "Now, can you tell me how you came to be in this position?" she asked softly. "Then we can decide what to do."

Soralis nodded and told her.

***

Four Day's Later Cheyenne Mountain Situation Room: 

Colonel Jack O'Neil flexed his shoulder, wincing as it protested. Somehow during their latest escapade through the Stargate, he had wrenched it rather badly. 

"Jack, good you're here," General Hammond said as he filed some papers away in his desk. 

O'Neil grinned as he sat down. He knew a lot of those papers were about his team. "So, what's up General?"

"Ever heard of a planet called Meydum?" the General asked.

"It's located somewhere near the third star from the right?" Jack asked flippantly.

The General smiled slightly. "No. It's the home of a Ga'ould queen called Isis. I think that should ring a bell."

Jack leaned back in the chair, thinking. "Isis. Sister-wife to Osiris right? One of the more powerful of the Egyptian deities. So translate that to Ga'ould, she'd be a powerful system lord in of herself. Am I right or am I right?"

"You've been studying." General Hammond replied, impressed. 

Jack shrugged it off. "So?"

"She contacted us about three days ago. Since then we've been gathering information about her, both as a "goddess" and as a ruler. For a Ga'ould, she's something of a moderate. Still has slaves, but she takes much better care of her people than most of the other Ga'ould lords we've run across. She also has some fondness for Earth and even sent one of her daughters here to govern it around seven thousand years ago."

This piqued Jack's interest. "What happened to the daughter?" he asked curiously.

"She died. Ra ordered her to be married to a rather unpleasant character called Akethros. She in combination with Isis and her brothers devised a plan to completely erase Earth from Ga'ould memory. Isis and company hid Earth by destroying as much of the data the Ga'ould had on it and the daughter buried the Stargate. During the fire-fight with Akethros' soldiers, she was shot and killed."

Jack raised his eyebrow. "And what does that have to do with us?

The general smiled. "She contacted us and offered to start negotiations. We can't afford to anger her. And she specifically asked for you."

"Should I feel flattered?" Jack asked cautiously.

"No. This smells Jack. But as I said, we can't afford to screw this up. Your team leaves in three hours."

"Yes sir." Jack got up to leave. 

"Jack?"

"Yeah?" O'Neil turned around.

"Be very careful." General Hammond said.

"Hey, it's me." He grinned and left.

"That's what I'm afraid of," Hammond told to himself.


	10. Chapt 10: StarGate

StarGate

**The past can be a real pain sometimes….**

**                                        From the Harvester's Journal**

Soralis shifted nervously, eyes fixated upon the Stargate. It had been more than ten years since they had last worked together. Jack probably thought she was dead. He would have no reason not to believe she dead. No normal person could survive an explosion, especially one that leveled a building with her in it.

/You all right?\ Qui Gon asked her mentally.

/Yeah. Just the guy walking through is somebody I once knew. And he's not gonna be real pleased with me being alive.\

/I thought he was your friend.\ Qui Gon said.

/He was. Only he thinks I'm dead and I kinda didn't tell him every little detail about myself. He won't appreciate that.\

Qui Gon snorted. /You were both playing black operation games. He'll understand. Hopefully.\

/You don't know Jack.\ she replied. /He can be… Difficult.\

The Stargate rumbled to life, the chevron's clicking into place and the wormhole activated with a flare of released energy.

/Here they come,\ Qui Gon said.

One at a time, the Sg1 team appeared. Soralis instantly recognized Jack; the others, she did not recognize. He was older than she remembered, more careworn, but still much the same. 

Jack O'Neil cautiously moved forward, the rest of his team fanning out behind him. His eyes swept the Stargate chamber, noting the Jaffa warriors placed in strategic positions around the area as well as the small group of individuals guarding the regal Ga'ould in full ceremonial robes. 

On the left of the Ga'ould lord was a tall woman in the full ceremonial robes of a high priestess. A platinum coronet etched with the symbols of Maat gleamed under white hair.

On the right of the Ga'ould was an even taller man with graying black hair and a neatly trimmed beard.  He was dressed in a white tunic, tan trousers, boots and a black cloak. An odd cylindrical object swung from his belt. Beside him was a boy of about fifteen or sixteen; dressed in much the same way, only instead of a black cloak, he wore a brown one. The rest of the people conformed to the dress of minor Ga'ould nobility.

As he came closer, he got a better look at the woman at Isis' left hand. In shock, he recognized the priestess. "Soralis?!" he blurted out.

"Hi Jack, long time no see huh?" she said dryly.

"Yeah, 'specially since you're supposed to be dead." He replied just as dryly.

"Never found a body did you?" she asked, arching an eyebrow.

"Couldn't. The whole building you 'died' in was blown to bits. Convenient, huh?" he said.

"Very." She smiled lightly.

"So are you a Ga'ould?" he asked bluntly.

Isis smiled, interrupting the dialogue. "No. The Isisethren is not a Ga'ould. I have acknowledged her as my daughter, nonetheless. She bears the memory and spirit of Tahmin, and will be respected as such." She said, the warning clear in her voice. "She is the reason why you are here Colonel. We have much to discuss before she returns home."

Jack sighed. "Alright my lady." He was here to listen to Isis' proposition after all. But then, he wasn't there to necessarily agree to whatever he heard.

***

Jack looked at Soralis intently. They were all seated around a marble table in one of the great conference halls. "So, how did you get here?" he asked.

"I took a major wrong turn underground." She said. 

He scowled. "Right. Tell it to me straight Soralis, I'm serious."

"Ok. Base line is we got two hell gods preparing to hit earth with everything they got. Once they've strip-mined it of all its resources and destroyed what they can't use, they're gonna start really lowering the real-estate value of the surrounding area."

Jack nodded, almost pleasantly. "So where do you come into that equation?"

Soralis lips twitched. "Those two hell gods are my grandfather and uncle respectively. And they both hate my guts. That's why I'm here. Around six months ago I was kidnapped by a powerful sorcerer called Quan Chi and taken to a remote world in this sector of space. There, his apprentice Xanatos subjected me too both physical and mental torture with the help of his partner, a renegade scientist called Morgan Leigh. During that time, I was caged with another prisoner, Jedi Master Qui Gon Jinn," she nodded to the man in the black cloak. 

"Qui Gon was investigating Morgan for suspicion of murder, unsanctioned use of bio-hazards and illegal experimentation on intelligent beings, when he too was kidnapped by Morgan." She paused for breath and Qui Gon took the thread of her narrative. 

"During the course of our captivity, we formed a mind-bond that Xanatos used to his advantage. Alone, we would have done everything in our power to escape, but with the mind-bond in place, all he had to do was torture one of us a bit in order to make the other behave. More insidious still, Xanatos' ultimate goal was to enslave us to the dark-side of the force." He said. Beside him, the boy, Obi-Wan paled at this calmly delivered statement. 

"Ok… That's real clear. What's the force and why is Soralis so important and who is Xanatos?"

Soralis sighed and began explaining. In more detail.

***

Shao Kahn paced, fuming. Twice. She had escaped twice. This single, half-breed bitch had eluded him and his creatures. It could not, would not be tolerated.  He snarled as someone laughed softly behind him.

"With a face like that, it's any wonder why no female will have anything to do with you." Shinnok said calmly.

Shao Kahn turned, snarling. "She escaped! Again! Why does this one female always get away?"

"Because you constantly underestimate her and the quality of mortals she tends to attract. This time, we will have both her and her father, if you exercise a little patience." Shinnok replied, smiling grimly. "And now we have two bonuses if we count both her mind-mate and his apprentice"

 "There is that." Shao Kahn conceded. He smiled slightly. "And after we have all of them in chains, we can have ourselves a proper family reunion." 

"Indeed," Shinnok replied.

***

It was finally over. She had told Jack almost everything about herself. It was unavoidable. Now the Sg1 team was comfortably asleep, in rooms Isis had graciously provided for them. Jack had agreed to take her home; to help her defeat Shao Kahn. She gazed at the star-strewn sky pensively. Soralis knew quite well the real battle lay ahead and there was a very good chance that they might lose, despite all of their planning. She heard movement behind her and she smiled slightly. It was Qui Gon.

"Can't sleep?" she asked him softly as he joined her.

"No," he replied.

"Bad dreams?" she queried, seeing how tired he looked.

"Yeah." He looked at her. "How much of it do you think was drug-hallucinations?" he asked, referring to the tortures they endured during their captivity.

Soralis turned away, throat moving as she swallowed dryly. "I… I don't know Qui Gon." She told him honestly. "Qui Gon, Morgan had us drugged most of the time. I don't think we will ever know what was real or not real."

He hugged her tightly. "What's happening to us?" he asked her softly. "The mind-link isn't fading. Is it?"

Soralis shook her head. "No. I don't think it is." She turned and touched his face. "I can still feel your emotions, hear your thoughts as if you shouted them out to me. It's hard to block them." 

"Why?" he asked.

"I don't know." She said. "I'm afraid," she confessed.

"Me too." He replied.


	11. Chapt 11: Earth

Earth

**Hell can be quite an educational experience…**

**                                                From the Harvester's Journal**

**_Cheyenne Mountain three days later:_**

Death… 

**Destruction…**

**Chaos…**

Soralis and her Jedi companions felt the tremors through the force as they tumbled out of the StarGate. "Gods, what's happening?" Obi Wan murmured as a dozen soldiers poured into the StarGate chamber. 

In the soldier's midst was a tall, balding man of about fifty or so. He was dressed similarly as they were, in green fatigues. "I see you brought friends along with you," he said, looking at Soralis and her Jedi companions.

Soralis had changed from her full ceremonial robes to loose black trousers, boots and a tunic, heavily embroidered with silver. A black and silver handled light-saber dangled from her sashed waist, while a strange, silvery, katana-like sword was slung across her back. Her hair was held back by a slim platinum circlet shaped into an Egyptian asp. The head of the asp was centered on her forehead and held a cut diamond like stone. 

Both Qui Gon and Obi Wan were dressed in similar tan trousers, white tunics and brown boots. The only difference was that Qui Gon was draped in his habitual black cloak and hood and the boy was draped in a brown one. Hammond frowned slightly. All three of them were kneeling on the floor, shivering as the dark-side sensations roiled over them

The woman was the first to recover, to recognize what the darkside tremors meant. "General, we don't have much time. A rift to Outland has opened in Los Angles. If we don't stop it, the entire world will become apart of Outland itself."

The General looked at her suspiciously. Cheyenne Mountain had just gone to red alert status after a seemingly massive earthquake had rocked the western seaboard, with the epicenter in LA itself. They couldn't get into the city as almost all of the roads going into it had either been destroyed or suffered major damage. 

Getting in by air was nearly impossible due to the fires that were currently ravaging the city.  As it was, they were still scrambling relief and rescue volunteers out to the surrounding areas and were slowly working their way inward to LA itself.

"Who are you?" he demanded harshly.

"I am Soralis de Mordant…" she began.

***

Shao Kahn paced in his throne room, thinking black thoughts. It had been going as planned. Soon, he would have his brother on his knees, and his niece in chains. Perhaps he would keep Rayden alive long enough witness his daughter's corruption and final descent into darkness.

"What you plan is foolish my son," Shinnok said, easily reading the Outland Emperor's thoughts. "You cannot turn Soralis, nor force her to serve you. The last god who tried was banished from the Earth Realms for all time. I am afraid she is more than you can handle."

Shao Kahn snarled. "She has escaped me twice. That cannot go unpunished."

"Then I suggest you do so cleverly. Simply torturing her or her companions will not do anything for you save to irritate her."

"Then how do you propose to do it?" Shao Kahn asked, gritting his teeth.

"Soralis has become corrupted by the mortals she protects. Her emotions run strong. Set them loose. Draw the beast out. Harness her rage to destroy those she cares for most." He smiled slightly. "Let her fall by her own designs, not by yours. Then you are blameless and she will be damned." 

"And then, she and all the power she possesses will belong to us," Shao Kahn finished, smiling grimly.

"Precisely," Shinnok agreed.

***

After Soralis had explained what was going on, the General had taken them all into a large conference room. "Is she on the level Jack?" he asked the Colonel. 

"Pretty much. Shao Kahn is a threat to the United States and the world in general. We don't deal with him, we're sunk."

"Huh," the General said and looked at Soralis. "So, can you close this rift?" he asked.

"Probably. Most likely way he's done it is by high-end sympathetic magicks. We find his focus, destroy it and the rift will close. Down-side is, he's probably got the focus somewhere in his castle, which is deep within the heart of Outland itself."

"And this Shao Kahn wants you and your companions fairly badly, am I right?" General Hammond asked shrewdly.

 "I'm afraid so,"

"Then, I can't let you go. It's too dangerous. You've already as much admitted that you have enough latent power to lay this entire planet to waste. We simply can't risk you falling into the wrong hands,"

Captain Carter coughed. "With all due respect sir, we can't do this without her. She's the only one who can get us to Outland."

General Hammond leaned back, thinking. "Alright, then let's minimize the risks of capture, shall we?" he said.

***

_LA, a day later:_

Rayden nearly blacked out as the centaur-like Kitaro flung him into what was once an overpass, but was now, a rubble heap. _That's going to leave a mark,_ he thought sarcastically as the miraculously restored Goro picked him up, cracking several of his ribs in the process. __

The rest of his team was having similar problems. The younger Sub-Zero was pitted against his demonically possessed older brother, Sonja was fighting Scorpion and Lui was surrounded by Outland shadow assassins. The rest of their team was scattered across Los Angeles, fighting undead, demons and a host of Outland Warriors. Night had descended on LA, a night that might never see the first dawn of day. 

As Goro prepared to deal the final blow to the nearly dead Thunder god, a furious roar shook the ruined buildings around them. Something huge blocked out the soot-filled sky, something terrifying.

A nearly seventy-foot tall, black dragon landed on the ruined overpass. Each of its seven heads snaked down, peering murderously at the combatants. The center head snapped out and bit into Kitaro's back and shook him like a rag doll. It flung the dead Centaurion into a ruined building, while the other heads hissed at Goro, who wisely dropped Rayden and fled. The rest of the Outlanders followed suit.

Lui, Kitana, Sonja and Sub-Zero backed away from the obviously pissed dragon, who ignored the fighters as it bent over the unconscious Thunder-God. "Um, guys, big dragon, our boss, not good." Lui managed, moving forward as one of the heads peered at them. 

One of the dragon's heads snarled at Rayden's champions, warning them away. They watched nervously, helplessly as it bent its others heads down; over the fallen, unconscious Thunder God. It opened its multiple mouths and breathed a silvery mist on Rayden which soaked into his broken, battered body. The mist soaked into his body, visibly healing it. Wounds disappeared, broken bones straightened and reknitted themselves. 

Rayden shivered and opened his eyes and then closed them, wishing he hadn't. _Ok, so I'm about to become dragon bait. _Soft laughter echoed in his mind.

_Can't recognize your own daughter can you?_ A very familiar, dry voice asked him.

His eyes flew open and he looked at the black dragon. "Soralis?!" he whispered as the dragon began to glow and shrink.


	12. Chapt 12: Outland

Family reunions can be very frightening.

From the Harvester's Journal

They raced towards the center of LA and stumbled to a halt, seeing the large, black, hole where hundreds of buildings used to be. The rim of the hole shimmered, sending shockwaves of evil and sickness out in radiating circles. 

They turned, forming a protective circle as hundreds of demons and outland mutants surrounded them, forcing them closer to the hole. 

"Hurry up Soralis!" Jack shouted, emptying his semi-automatic pistol at the horde, felling a half-dozen of the monsters. 

"Qui Gon, Obi-Wan, I need your strength!" Soralis shouted, holding out her hands to them.

The two Jedi grabbed her hands, adding their spirits and strength to the task at hand. Blue, green and white energy surrounded the entire group, forming a crackling white shield, that contracted around them. With an audible pop of rushing air, the shield collapsed around the group, just as the foul army gathered the courage to rush them.__

***

**Outland a few hours later:**

Soralis stared up at Shao Kahn's fortress. She had barely escaped with her sanity intact, and now she was going to send a fourteen year old boy and a scholar into that hell-hole.

"Neither of you have to do this," she said finally. "This is a job for an army not…"

"I know. But you're right. Out of all of us, Daniel and I have the best chance of finding the rift device and destroying it. Daniel doesn't really have the kind of combat experience needed in this kind of fight. I'm the only other force-sensitive who can be spared to search for it. He has the skills needed to defuse the damned thing. It's logical," Obi Wan said firmly, though his hands shook with fear and his face was pale with it. 

They were all huddled in a small ruined building just on the edge of Shao Kahn's fortress. Rayden looked at his daughter. "You can't kill either Shinnok or Shao Kahn Soralis."

Soralis smiled grimly Rayden, knowing full well what was going through his head. "I am too old to throw away either my or Qui Gon's soul for revenge. My plan is to simply distract them long enough so that Obi Wan and Daniel can sneak into the castle and destroy Shao Kahn's focus. Between all of us, I think we can manage that." 

"I think I should be with them," Kitana spoke up finally. "I know the castle better than anyone, I can get them inside easily enough."

Soralis nodded. "Good idea."

"So where does that leave us?" Jack asked quietly. 

"Your job is to keep Shao Kahn's troopers away from us." Soralis replied. 

"That sounds easy," Jack retorted sarcastically. 

"Compared to dealing with hell gods, it is." Soralis replied. "Oh. Whatever happens, don't attack first and especially don't attack either Shao Kahn, Shinnok or Quan Chi."

"Why?" Sam asked curiously.

"If you loose, you'll loose both your life and soul," Lui told her.

"Let's get this over with," Daniel said softly. Together they snuck out of the building. As they neared the fortress, Kitana motioned for Obi Wan and Daniel to follow her. They split off from the main group and slipped inside the castle, while Rayden, Soralis and the rest moved towards the castle's courtyard. "This is really stupid." Jack muttered. 

"Yeah. I know." Soralis murmured back. "But, this is the only way." _Best behavior guys. That is, unless they decide to be naughty. _She told them all mentally. 

_And you know they're going to be naughty._ Qui Gon shot back, his face unreadable as they saw the welcoming party that was gathered in the once beautiful plaza.

Surrounding Shao Kahn was a host of powerful Outland mutants, his best warriors and the generals of his combined armies. Rayden recognized Goro, Scorpion, and the Elder Sub Zero offhand. Qui Gon stiffened as he recognized his former apprentice Xanatos. The now immortal Jedi smiled bitterly at the younger man. _So you are finally realizing what it is to be a servant of evil Padawan. You will always be a slave now._ He thought sadly.

Xanatos snarled, sensing the pity rise up out of the one person he hated most. Pity. He would have rather have felt hatred. Sanctimonious Jedi. He despised them all. 

Shao Kahn smirked at the pitifully small group of warriors Rayden commanded. "Welcome home brother."

"This was never my home _brother_." Rayden snorted as he moved closer, flanked by Soralis and her mindmate, Qui Gon. "You will not destroy Earth!"

"I'm afraid that's not the issue." Shao Kahn snarled, raising his hand. A bolt of brilliant red light arched out, only to be met and deflected by a shimmering blue-white shield. 

Soralis' eyes were utterly black as she lowered her own hand. Two pinpoints of boiling green light flickered in the center, where her pupils should have been. "Naughty, naughty uncle. Didn't grandfather teach you how to play nice?"

"No." he snapped. "Kill them! All of them except for these three!" he shouted.

Jack and the others took that as their cue to scatter, closely followed by Shao Kahn's warriors. From the shadows, Shinnok smirked and did nothing. _Clever child. Clever, clever child. Keep his attention on you, while your friends destroy the rift device._ _He does not look above the obvious as you hoped._

Shinnok knew very well that Shao Kahn had come damningly close to breaking the covenant between heaven and hell by taking Soralis the first time. The only thing that had saved him from complete damnation was the fact that he did not know she was the Isisethren. Shinnok wondered if his youngest son was so dense as to not realize that. Or wondered if he cared. 

***

Jack ducked under the wild swing of an Outland mutant and grabbed the thing's arm. He swung it into a rather hard rock wall and slammed a dagger into its heart killing it. The thing burst into stinging dust particles. 

He dove behind a ruined colonnade, just as blaster fire erupted around him. "She gets me killed, I'm gonna haunt her for the rest of my afterlife!" he avowed.

***

 Daniel followed Obi Wan and Kitana through the castle. "Which way?" Kitana asked Obi Wan softly as they came across three tunnels.

The boy frowned, concentrating. He felt a rippling disturbance, different from the bleak despair and evil that pervaded the place. It felt like a dissonant wail that shivered through his bones in a perceptible wave. "That way," he said pointing to the central passageway.

Kitana nodded. "Figures. That leads directly to the center of the castle. To his rooms in fact." 

Daniel smirked. "This guy has a real paranoia problem doesn't he?" he asked as they walked down the hallway.

"You have no idea." Kitana replied dryly.

***

Qui Gon and Rayden squared off against Quan Chi, while Soralis focused on Shao Kahn. The two of them circled, testing each other's defenses, waiting for the right moment to attack.

"I am curious, why haven't you lost your powers like your father?" Shao Kahn asked as he mentally pushed against her shields, finding them to be rock solid, far stronger than he had anticipated and far more flexible than he thought they should be. His mental "hands" slid against the suddenly "slippery" surface and he withdrew back into his own mind.

"Most of my powers and immortality come from mother," Soralis replied, grinning as he tried to blast her shields down with bolts of pure hatred. 

Shao Kahn blinked as power swirled around the younger immortal, enveloping her in a softly glowing blue-white radiance. He snarled, swinging his body into a round-house kick. Soralis ducked under the attack, still grinning slightly, almost as if she were amused. 

"Is that all you've got uncle? I guess we now know why you always send you're bully boys to do your dirty work," she sneered.

"You'll pay for that," he growled, his eyes glowing with a pale, leprous light. The air crackled with black lightening, only to be met by a whirling tornado of pure energy. 

*** 

Obi Wan felt the disturbance in the force a split second before a blue lightsaber came hurtling out of the darkness. He deflected it with the force while Kitana and Daniel ducked behind the rift device.

Xanatos stepped out of an alcove, grinning slightly as he caught the lightsaber in his hand. "So you're my replacement huh?" he asked. "Qui Gon's tastes in Padawans has gone down hill in the past few decades,"

Obi Wan chuckled at the Sith's attempt to anger him. "It depends largely on your point of view I guess," 

Xanatos strode forward, dropping into a classic defense pose. "I'm supposed to bring you in alive," he grinned at the boy. "But they never said in what condition,"

Obi-Wan copied the Sith's defensive stance and mockingly saluted him with his raised lightsaber. "Come and get me," he laughed and unexpectedly darted out of the room. 

Xanatos cursed and raced after him. 


	13. Chapt 13: Manifestations

_**On the road of vengeance, procure two coffins. One for yourself and one for the one you love most. **_

_**From the Harvester's Journal**_

**Soralis pushed back, her eyes now boiling with green and black energy. Power swirled around the combatants, each wanting the other dead. She was dimly aware of another titanic battle going on, between a demon sorcerer, her father and mind-mate. But it didn't matter. Nothing mattered.**

**_He tried to take my soul. He would have killed my father. He has killed thousands, millions of innocents. He Will DIE NOW! _She thought.**

**Shao Kahn laughed mockingly. "You hate me for what I have done. I _made_ you into what you are! You are death! Death and sorrow, hell come to earth!"**

**Soralis snarled, ducking a viscous backhand. "You did nothing but mutilate my mind and body. I refused the first evil once. I refuse to be anyone's slave!"**

**She returned the backhand with an equally brutal telekinetic strike that sent the would-be world destroyer through a wall.**

**Qui Gon winced as the waves of hatred slammed into his already thin shields. _Coming from Soralis_. He thought as he dodged a wave of energy daggers streaming from Quan Chi's outstretched, clawed fingers.**

"**She's going to kill him!" he shouted.**

"**No time! Concentrate on him!" Rayden shouted back. "She'll do the right thing." he added, dodging energy tentacles that threatened to trip and entangle him.**

**_I hope. For all our sakes. _Rayden really didn't want to have to kill his own daughter. It would rip him to shreds.**

**Xanatos was good. Very good as a matter of fact.**

**Obi Wan blocked a strike, and found it was a feint. The dark lord lashed out with his foot, tripping the boy.**

**He fell hard, the breath knocked out of him. "Maybe I should start with your feet. How would you like to spend the rest of your life a cripple?" Xanatos sneered, playfully waving his lightsaber in front of Obi Wan's boots. **

**Obi Wan skittered back, calling his lightsaber to hand. Xanatos noted it and intercepted the blade before it could land in place. "No, no, no." he shook his finger mockingly.**

**Obi Wan eyes flicked desperately around the hallway, looking for any kind of weapon to use. His eyes were wide as Xanatos ignited the boy's own lightsaber and dipped the tip to his leg, touching it.**

**The pain was immense.**

"**You can do so many interesting things with a lightsaber you know. I would love to show them to you. Do me a favor. Don't pass out." he chuckled in amusement and the lightsaber dipped again, lighting on the other leg.**

**His screams were music to the dark apprentice's ears.**

**Daniel jerked as he heard the boy's cries of pain. "Kitana, help him!" he snapped. "I'll figure this out!"**

"**Hurry!" Kitana said, ducking out into the hallway and ran like hell towards the direction of the screams.**

**He circled around, looking for runes, anything. He stopped, slapping his head with the palm of his hand. "I am so dense!" he shook his head and grabbed a morning star from Shao Kahn's private collection of weaponry. He brought it down on the crystal formation resembling the land contours of Los Angeles. The backlash of energy flung him into a rather hard wall. His head connected and blackness engulfed him.**

**Obi Wan closed his eyes as Xanatos loomed over him. The saber dipped. He could hear the tell-tale hiss as it stroked his arm, sending blinding, gut-wrenching waves of pain down his arm and into his body. He wailed.**

**Xanatos laughed. "You scream much like your master. It didn't take much more than that to make him yell." he chuckled. "Jedi are so weak!"**

**Obi Wan opened his eyes. "Only evil is weak." he hissed, and lashed out with his legs, the pain nearly sending him into unconsciousness.**

**Xanatos fell as Kitana came into view, still too far away to be much help.**

**With the last bit of his mental strength, he yanked his lightsaber out of Xanatos' hand, igniting it as it landed snugly into his hand. He struggled to his feet, using the wall as support.**

**Xanatos got up, glaring at the wounded boy. "Spirited. I shall enjoy breaking you!" **

**Obi wan met his charge, the lightsabers locked, desperately trying to keep Xanatos at bay. That's when the shockwave of energy reached them. Xanatos screamed as concussive waves of light and sound shrieked through him, knocking him senseless. Obi Wan followed suit. Kitana dropped to her knees, clapping her hands over her ears as the wave reached and passed her, leaving her breathless and head hurting like hell. When the wave past, she staggered to her feet, and like an automon, managed to hook an arm around her out-cold friend, dragging him away from the downed sith apprentice.**

**Daniel came to, slowly, reluctantly. He lurched to his feet, using the wall as a brace. He looked at the shattered rift device, memory a persnickety thing indeed. _Did I smash that? _he thought and winced as his head roared at him in protest at the slightest movement. He used the mace in his hand as a crutch and limped out of the room, heading by blind instinct towards the hallway leading outside. The sounds of a very nasty fight helped guide him.**

**Quan Chi scowled as he back-handed Rayden into a wall. The nearly powerless thunder god sank to the floor, unconscious. He turned his attention to the Jedi, battered, bruised, but most defiantly alive and not willing to simply give up.**

**"Give in Jedi. Save yourself some pain." the demon snarled.**

**"Jedi don't give up," Qui Gon said mildly. "Nor do we give in to evil."**

**"Then you will die and your pretty mind-mate with you." he chuckled. "And I will have your apprentice for a mid-morning snack."**

**Qui Gon launched himself at the demon, his body limned with a bright blue aura. Quan Chi backpedaled at the sudden attack.**

**Soralis winced as Shao Kahn grabbed her by the neck and slammed her into a once grand looking marble column. She saw stars for a moment as he banged her head repeatedly against the hard surface. She focused, naked hatred twisting her expression.**

**_Evil seeks its way in through anger, hatred and fear. Let the darkness in once; it takes root, like a weed. It spreads like poison ivy. And it is as hard to destroy. _Soralis remembered, the first lesson Prophet had ever taught her . _You are afraid. You fear him, fear makes you angry, anger turns to hatred easily. Only by letting it go will you be victorious. Hanging onto it will only destroy you and those you love most. LET IT GO! _Prophet's voice seemed to roar in her mind. She went limp and inward, eyes rolling back into her head as she feigned unconsciousness.**

**Shao Kahn cackled, reaching for her mind, intending to shatter it in an implacable mental grip. Under a shadowy veil, Soralis waited, garnering her strength. Even now at the end of her resources, she still had enough power to fell a rampaging, rabid elephant. As the warlord entered her mind she screamed, putting all of her pent up emotions and psychic energy into it. As she did so, the energy wave from the broken rift-device slammed into them.**

**Bleak despair. **

**Anger.**

**Hate.**

**Black rage. **

**Pure power.**

**The combined released energy rocketed through the warlord, sending him reeling back, clutching his head as he screamed in a high-pitched voice, adding to the chaos around them. Noise, light, power swirled and danced around them, slamming into walls, crumbling them, bouncing across flagstones, causing weird effects. Grass grew rampant, waving menacingly, climbing up marble columns like vines only to wither and die in the harsh outland environment. Poisonous flowers bloomed, choked and died, leaving husks of strangeness around the courtyard. **

**In the middle of this, Quan Chi staggered back as the concussive wave from the rift device and Soralis' own strike-shriek hit him. At the same time, Qui Gon threw a round-house punch, connecting solidly on the monster's chin. The demon went down. Before he could finish the job, Quan chi disappeared in a crackling wave of energy.**

**Soralis' eyes opened as Rayden and Qui Gon knelt beside her. Her eyes were black, an endless night. "Death comes not on wings." she whispered.**

**"Hush," Rayden said worriedly.**

**"The balance not met, the balance unstruck." she continued, mindlessly, looking inward. "Gates shut, gates open."**

**She stood, her body seemingly boneless, looking at her father. "It ends," she said meaninglessly.**

**That's when the earth began to rumble underfoot.**

**Jack stumbled as the earth began to shake. "Oboy." he muttered. "Not good not good, not good!" he shouted, racing back towards the courtyard. The others more or less followed suit.**

**Shinnok eyes widened from the shadows of the courtyard as his granddaughter stood. He knew above all else what she was doing, what was taking over. No. Not the symbiont. Something far more dangerous. Something far more primal. **

**The Isisethrene was manifesting. **

**And she wasn't happy.**

**"It ends now!" she growled.**

**The earth began to crack.**

**Motes of light began to dance around them, gold and silver, concentrating around the Isisethrene. She turned her attention towards the warlords. Her eyes were black with hints of swirling color deep within them. She walked slowly, purposely towards them. **

"**You have broken the covenant." she hissed. "Not once, not twice. You seek power stripped from you, by the elders themselves. You seek to become what you once were." she accused Shinnok. "You unlawfully created a device that sapped the gods strength and immortality. You broke the barrier between worlds. All for power. All for vanity." she turned to Shao Kahn.**

"**You aided him in this. For jealousy and hatred and lust for power. You to seek what you cannot by law have. You assaulted your own neice, you tortured her mind and soul, all in an attempt to make her into a monster. All in an attempt to turn her into a weapon against the gods themselves." she snarled. "Your niece is my chosen avatar. You have thrice sinned. Shao Kahn. You did not care for kin, neither of you did. Only tools for you to use and disregard."**

**Power swirled, the motes glistened, taking shape. Figures appeared, slightly out of sync with the rest of reality. The elders took shape, regal, powerful beyond words. Three beings. Propriety, Wisdom and Benevolence. The virtues that governed mankind.**

"**Your accusations are severe Isisethrene,"**

**The Isisethrene laughed, low and chillingly. "But nonetheless true. Not proper behavior for gods at all, don't you think?"**

**Shinnok paled as the virtues looked in his direction. "She speaks truth my lord Shinnok. Once again you have violated the covenant." Propriety remarked.**

"**Once again you unlawfully seek entry into the Earth Realms." the Isisethrene added. **

"**Once again you will be sent back to Carceri, the NetherRealms of Hades." Benevolence intoned.**

"**NO!" Shinnok railed, rushing forward, grabbing Rayden before anyone could act.**

"**I will not go back. He will die first!" he said, hands glowing with a leprous light. The thundergod gasped as a painful surge of energy coursed through his body. His knees buckled as the air was forced out of his lungs, leaving him groggy and weakened.**

**Jack crouched behind a wall, looking at the stalemate. He knew that they wouldn't risk Rayden's life. _Looks like we'll have to end this the old fashioned way. Hope Sparky will forgive me,_ he thought, taking careful aim at the Thundergod with his semi-automatic pistol. He squeezed the trigger.**

**Rayden felt the punch of the bullet enter his shoulder. _That's new,_ he thought before he sank into blackness.**

**Shinnok loosened his grip on his son, startled by the shot. The Isisethrene took the advantage, ripping Rayden away from his father. The hell-god screamed as the motes surrounding the Isisethrene flitted to him, swirling around like a maelstrome. Winds began to howl, sounding like a dirge of a thousand lost and suffering voices. His face began to boil, to melt away, turning to ash. In seconds, he was nothing more than a few flakes of black dust. With that, the woman that was the Isisethrene collasped. Shao Kahn took the opportunity to flee. No one thought to take him down, all were too shell-shocked to act.**

**Jack raised his hand cautiously. "Um, glowy guys? What now?" he asked.**

**The Virtues smiled at the mortal. "That which was will be once more," Benevolence said. The three deities began to glow, brighter and brighter. **

"**The balance will be met," Wisdom said quietly as Jack sank into unconsciousness. **

"**And virtue will be rewarded in kind,"Propriety whispered as the others similarly felt darkness enclose around them. **


	14. Chapt 14: Immortal Dreams

_Soralis stood in the middle of a graveyard. A shimmering mist hung over the headstones, the stars shown bright and clear in the desert's night sky._

"_I am the harbringer of death. His sorrow upon the world, his gray joke on his enemies." She told the Jedi beside her. "The dead speak out to me. I cannot help but to answer them." she turned to face him._

"_You must know what I face. What you will face if you decide to let the bond stay." she turned back to the graveyard. "This is only the tip of the iceberg. It gets worse."_

_Other images, stranger and more horrible than the graveyard answered an unseen summons. Demonic hordes, a dying earth. Bodies stacked like cordwood. Darkness creeping over world upon world like a foul blanket. And beyond that. An evil older than time, more powerful than he had ever sensed. The first evil, sensing a new power, lusting after it. After him. _

"_With power, comes price. You are just beginning to know it. Can you stand to watch your friends grow old and die while you remain as you are? Can you stand against the evil that will whisper in your ear, that will tempt you?" she walked closer._

"_Will you be able to hold the power that the Isisethrene will bring through the link we share? For you will be able to call on the powers that I command. All of them. Just as I will be able to call on yours. Both the sweet and bitter. And the bitter will far outweigh the sweet."_

_Qui Gon swallowed. "You have fought alone for along time, haven't you?"_

_Soralis smiled humorlessly. "More than three thousand years. And eternity stretches out before me. Such is the price of immortality."_

"_Someone must help you. Someone must keep you from falling." Qui Gon replied_

"_It isn't an easy choice Qui Gon," _

"_I know," he told her. "But you shouldn't do it alone."_

"_Gods help you then." she sighed, holding out her hand._

"_May the force help us both." he took the proffered hand in his own._

_Power flared around them in an agonizingly bright wave of light. _

Qui Gon opened his eyes. They were translucent gold.


End file.
